THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

WALLACE  IBWIN 


"l WAS  SORT  OF   THINKING    HOW   I'D   LIKE   TO   HEAR   YOU   MAKE   A 

SPEECH IF    YOU   WERE    ANYBODY'S    HUSBAND   BUT   MINE" 


THE 

BLOOMING 
ANGEL 


BY 

WALLACE   IRWIN 

THOB  OF  "VENUS  IN  THE  EAST,"  "PILGEI 

INTO  FOLLY,"  "LETTERS  OF  A  JAPANESE 

SCHOOLBOY,"    ETC. 


NEW  ^ST  YORK 
GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1919, 
By  George  II.  Doran  Company 


Copyright,  1919,  by  The  Curtis  Publishing  Company 
Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 


TO  FLOSSIE'S  OEIGINAL 


M575167 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I    LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS n 

II    AN  ANNOYANCE 41 

III  "WHO   EVER   TOLD   You   You   COULD 

MAKE  A  SPEECH?" 50 

IV  Two  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR    ....  63 
V    THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS  ....  76 

VI    BOTTLED  BLUSHES 95 

VII    CASTAWAYS 115 

VIII    BUFFALO  WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS  128 

IX    SUSIE  THE  BULL 142 

X    WHAT  ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  COULD  Do  155 

XI    THE  PINK  VERDICT 170 

XII    How  SHE  INTRODUCED  HIM  TO  IMMOR 
TAL  FAME 190 

XIII  A  FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR      .  210 

XIV  ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT 225 

XV    KATZENJAMMER 242 

XVI    THE  BROADWAY  REST  CURE     .     .     .     .  254 

XVII    A  PALE  GHOST  AND  A  SOLID  TRUTH     .  263 

vii 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

BT   MAY   WILSON   PRESTON 

"I — WAS  SORT  OF  THINKING  HOW  I'D  LIKE  TO  HEAR 
YOU  MAKE  A  SPEECH — IF  YOU  WERE  ANYBODY'S 

HUSBAND  BUT  MINE"       ....         Frontispiece 

PAGE 

"YOU'VE  LOST  YOUR  NOTES,  MR.  ClCERO "  .          46 

'MR.  HORN,"  TACTFULLY  SUGGESTED  AUNT  HET, 
"DON'T  YOU  THINK  WE  HAD   BETTER  TRY  A 

LITTLE  BLUE  IN  THE  RED OSCAR'S  WRONGS 

AREN'T  AT  ALL  THE  SHADE  YOU'RE  USING"      .     134 

"You  WON'T  EVER  GET  OVER  WANTING  TO  BE 
CICERO,  WILL  YOU?" 198 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


CHAPTER  I 

LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS 

As  this  is  but  a  reporter's  record  of  that 
hard-contested  case,  The  Immortal  Gods  vs. 
The  Red  Tam-o'-Shanter,  it  might  be  simplest 
to  begin  near  the  point  of  contact  between 
Olympus  and  a  headpiece  more  disturbing  than 
fair  Helen's  hank  of  hair. 

In  the  easy-going  babyhood  of  the  twentieth 
century — I  then  being  an  unkempt  sophomore 
— there  stood  upon  the  museum  of  Dyak  Uni 
versity  four  tall,  stark  ancients,  sixteen- footers 
by  actual  measurement ;  and  these  figures,  like 
many  another  unattainable  ideal,  repelled  the 
average  imagination  and  cast  a  frost  upon  the 
youthful  passer-by.  In  the  last  sunset  rays  of 
one  lovely  California  evening  this  pompous 
four  presided  abstractedly  over  the  huddled 
human  scene  and,  for  all  I  know,  focused  their 
blind  marble  gaze  upon  a  small  building  in  the 

ii 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


outskirts  of  Dyak,  a  poor  little  house  loudly 
labeled  Bon  Ton  Laundry. 

The  ancient  four  were,  as  you  have  by  now 
guessed,  statues  ;  but  he  who  was  at  that  mo 
ment  putting  a  finishing  touch  on  his  shave 
somewhere  behind  the  Bon  Ton  sign  was  quiv- 
eringly  human.  The  statues  were  supposed  to 
be  of  Carrara  marble,  though  the  smallest 
freshman  in  the  world  who  had  risked  his  fool 
ish  neck  to  decorate  their  togaed  chests  with 
the  numerals  1900  testified  unofficially  that 
they  were  nothing  but  cast  iron  enameled  white 
and  treated  with  a  coat  of  waterproof  varnish. 
As  you  counted  them,  left  to  right,  they  were 
intended  likenesses  of  Phidias,  ^Eschylus,  De 
mosthenes  and  Homer.  The  cigarette-whif 
fing  multitude  who  passed  below,  daily  flowing 
toward  History  5-B,  learned  long  since  to  ad 
dress  them  rather  familiarly  as  Hideous,  Ery 
sipelas,  Gazabo  and  Jeff.  The  average  boy  is 
a  realist;  but  Chester  A.  Framm,  during  his 
three  and  a  fraction  years  of  college  life,  had 
been  too  self-supporting  and  self-sufficient  to 
catch  the  spirit  of  the  crowd.  He  and  his 
mother  had  come  all  the  way  from  Napa 
County  to  this  second-rate  but  thriving  institu 
tion.  Being  a  few  years  older  than  the  average 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  13 

student  had  helped  him  to  finance  his  mother 
from  a  washerwoman  into  a  laundry.  Life 
had  been  real,  earnest  and  unsocial  with  him, 
as  it  is  apt  to  be  with  the  young  man  who  gains 
his  college  degree  by  the  sweat  of  his  brow. 

Chester  was  rubbing  that  brow  with  a  damp 
towel  as,  on  the  eve  of  great  possibilities,  he 
came  out  of  the  washroom  and  confronted  his 
mother  in  the  neat  sitting  room,  which  despite 
its  detachment  from  business  always  reeked 
of  heated  irons  upon  starchy  muslin.  He  was 
a  tall  young  man  with  rather  a  magnificent 
head;  a  size  too  magnificent,  perhaps,  for  his 
destiny.  Some  remote  Scandinavian  ancestor 
who  had  given  him  his  name  had  substituted 
a  sense  of  sublimity  for  a  sense  of  humor — or 
possibly  this  is  unfair. 

"Ches,"  said  the  square,  red-elbowed 
woman,  who  sat  near  the  oilclothed  table  and 
raised  her  steel-framed  spectacles,  "are  you 
going  to  be  the  principal  speaker  in  this  dee- 
bate  at  Adelphi  Hall?" 

"No,  ma,"  he  confessed,  blushing  a  northern 
blush.  "I  was  only  admitted  to  the  debating 
society  last  week.  Carlotta  says  that  I  ought 
to  begin  in  a  small  way." 

"Oh;"     Mrs.   Framm   was   plainly   disap- 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


pointed.  Then  her  rock-bound  old  face  wrin 
kled  to  a  grim  smile  as  she  soliloquized:  "So 
you're  calling  her  Carlotta  now!" 

"There's  no  crime  in  that,"  he  grunted,  well 
aware  that  the  blush  was  encroaching  upon  his 
shoulder  blades.  "I've  known  her  over  a 
month." 

"So  you  have,  dear."  Her  large  face  soft 
ened  to  a  look  of  maternal  pride.  "Ches,  it's 
high  time  you  was  going  with  some  girls  — 
nice  girls,  I  mean.  None  o'  them  highty-tighty 
fly-away  red  Tam-o'-Shanters,  smoking  cig- 
areets  on  the  sly,  what  with  paint  and  powder 
and  loud  behavior  with  men.  But  I  believe  in 
marrying  young;  your  father  and  me  was 
married  when  we  was  picking  hops  on  a  farm 
up  in  Napa.  But  you're  educated,  Ches.  And 
Carlotta  Beam,  being  a  professor's  daughter 
and  serious  -  " 

"I'm  not  married  yet,"  declared  her  son  as 
he  fussed  with  the  stringy  black  cravat,  which 
when  tied  accentuated  his  parliamentary  ap 
pearance. 

"No,  but  you  must  look  round.  She's  got 
ambitions,  that  Beam  girl.  And  not  only  that  ; 
she's  the  sort  that'll  put  ambition  into  any 


man." 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  15 

"I  don't  know  as  I  want  to  become  a  pro 
fessor,  exactly,"  he  demurred. 

"You  don't  need  to,  Ches.  But  I  don't  in 
tend  you  shall  go  into  the  laundry  business. 
And  you  shan't  be  one  of  them  society  sports, 
what  with  giggling  yellow-haired  chits  and 
dancing  all  night " 

"Where's  my  coat?"  interrupted  her  heart's 
treasure. 

Mrs.  Framm  brought  the  greenish  thing  out 
of  a  closet.  They  called  them  Prince  Alberts 
in  those  days,  and  this  example  had  belonged 
to  the  late  Mr.  Framm.  It  hung  loosely  over 
Chester's  rangy  form,  but  combined  with  his 
halo  of  blond  hair  and  his  senatorial  counte 
nance  the  ensemble  was  imposing. 

"Oh,  Chester!"  cried  his  mother,  "if  you 
could  become  a  great  orator  I'd  die  happy.  I 
would  indeed.  Are  you  going  to  take  Miss 
Carlotta  to  the  dee-bate?" 

"Why — ah" — he  had  slipped  on  his  shabby 
brown  hat  and  stood  wincing  to  be  off — "I 
promised  to  escort  her  to  the  hall.  She's  the 
principal  for  the  negative." 

"What's  it  all  about— this  dee-bate?" 

"Resolved:  That  Application  is  more  use 
ful  than  Genius." 


16  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"It  is,"  decreed  his  Spartan  mother.  "And 
good  night,  dearie.  And  make  a  good  speech. 
And  just  follow  Miss  Carlotta's  advice  in  ev 
erything — she's  the  sort  of  girl  that " 

She  encircled  his  neck  with  the  strong  arms 
which  for  as  long  as  he  could  remember  had 
been  bare  up  to  the  elbow. 

After  a  dutiful  kiss  he  was  speeding  into  the 
dusk  when  she  called  after  him:  "Ches-ter!" 

He  came  back  into  the  light  of  the  doorway 
and  saw  she  was  holding  out  to  him  two  small 
objects — a  brown  book  and  a  disk  of  tin. 

"Here's  your  Platform  Elegance,"  she  told 
him.  "You  might  need  it  to  look  something 
up  in." 

"Thank  you,  ma." 

"And  you'd  better  take  this  can  of  Ajax  Hay 
Fever  Balm.  You  know  your  hay  fever — ex 
cuse  me.  I  forgot  you  never  liked  to  have  it 
mentioned.  But  this  time  of  year  when  every 
thing's  gone  to  seed  and  it's  sort  of  dry  and  the 
greasewood  begins  blowing — I  thought  you 
looked  sort  o'  red  round  the  nostrils  this  morn 
ing." 

"I  won't  need  it,  thank  you." 

And  Chester  A.  Framm  stalked  away  to* 
ward  higher  things. 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  17 

A  great  orange-colored  moon  was  rising  in 
the  east,  gilding  the  dry  tattered  stalks  of  eu 
calyptus  trees  along  the  walk  toward  Faculty 
Row;  occasionally  the  conical  nuts  would  fall 
among  dry  leaves,  giving  forth  the  crackle  of 
fairy  artillery.  In  the  moony  distance  Chester 
could  see  the  white  fagade  of  the  museum  and 
its  four  top-heavy  brethren  guarding  the  roof. 
Fame,  immortality,  disdain  of  compromise! 
Why  had  Charlotta  Beam  sought  him  out  from 
the  mass  and  chosen  him  for  the  high  peaks 
of  destiny? 

Chester  A.  Framm  had  just  turned  twenty- 
five.  He  was  now  early  in  his  senior  year  at 
Dyak,  and  though  the  college  could  not  rank 
with  Leland  Stanford  or  the  University  of  Cal 
ifornia,  three  years  of  constant  application  to 
his  major  subject,  economics,  had  convinced 
him  that  he  had  sufficient  ability  to  lead  a  class 
of  several  hundred  in  a  race  for  honors. 

Always  shy  of  young  women  he  had  care 
fully  avoided  the  more  or  less  alluring  glances 
of  the  coeducational  half,  clustered  in  lecture 
halls  or  round  the  Quad. 

His  mother  had  been  ambitious  for  him  in  a 
general  way;  but  her  dreams  had  never  gone 
beyond  the  state  which  she  called  educated. 


18  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Chester  had  started  college  life  late;  yet  his 
aspirations  had  been  as  fluid  and  nebulous  as 
any  cherished  by  the  lightest-minded  Gamma 
Gamma  on  the  campus — until  crystallization 
had  come  through  contact  with  Carlotta  Beam. 

Professor  Cyrus  Beam,  who  conducted  the 
English  Department,  had  asked  him  with  the 
rest  of  the  senior  class  to  a  reception  on  Fac 
ulty  Row.  That  was  early  in  the  semester. 
On  that  occasion  Chester  had  been  all  feet  and 
hands,  treading  on  toes,  knocking  over  bric-a- 
brac  in  the  crush  of  distinguished  educators  at 
the  Beam  cottage.  Mrs.  Beam — popularly 
known  as  Hissing  Hattie — had  shaken  hands 
clammily  and  all  but  scared  him  to  death.  He 
had  been  wondering,  as  bashful  men  do,  if  he 
could  escape  without  attracting  too  much  at 
tention,  when  Carlotta  herself,  a  vision  in  flow 
ing  white,  had  come  swimming  toward  him  out 
of  the  intellectual  mob. 

It  had  been  tremendously  confusing,  uplift 
ing,  inspiring.  Carlotta,  who  was  stately  and 
rather  tall,  had  fixed  him  with  a  tragic  look  of 
interest  on  her  serious  face ;  she  was  handsome 
in  a  Slavic  way,  though  somewhat  inclined  to 
sallowness.  Chester's  first  thought  had  been 
that  here  was  an  anchor  to  which  he  could  tie 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  19 

his  seasick  craft;  every  piece  of  furniture  in 
the  room  contained  a  plaster  cast  and  he  had 
already  knocked  down  two.  Carlotta  had 
seemed  as  anxious  to  learn  about  him  as  though 
he  had  been  some  vaulting  celebrity  already 
arrived. 

"Why  don't  you  try  for  the  William  H.  Bar- 
bour  prize?"  she  asked  him  over  her  lemonade 
later  in  the  evening  of  enhancement. 

Chester  had  stuttered  something  to  the  ef 
fect  that  he  had  never  made  a  speech  in  his  life, 
that  he  didn't  even  belong  to  the  debating  so 
ciety. 

"Not  belong  to  the  debating  society !"  The 
fair  Carlotta  showed  just  a  trace  of  resem 
blance  to  Hissing  Hattie  in  that  shocked 
exclamation.  "You  must  join  to-morrow.  I 
owe  more  to  the  debating  society  than  to  any 
other  one  thing." 

Then  he  had  remembered  that  Carlotta's 
oration  had  won  the  prize  the  year  before.  Did 
she  think  he  had  even  a  slight  chance?  Car 
lotta  was  sure  of  it.  Chester  had  been  faint 
with  emotion  as  he  poured  forth  confessions 
such  as  he  had  never  made  to  any  man  or 
woman;  seons  of  space,  chasms  of  ambitious 


20  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

distance  he  had  leaped  in  that  first  revealing 
conversation. 

Walking  along  to-night  in  California's 
winter  moonlight,  the  Mighty  Four  looming 
closer  in  the  distance,  Chester  thrilled  again  to 
think  of  that  high  purpose  to  which  she  had 
roused  him. 

"America  needs  orators/'  she  had  said,  re 
garding  him  with  the  look  of  a  muse  about  to 
burst  into  a  tragic  song.  "Our  statesmen  to 
day  are  little  business  men  quarreling  over 
petty  figures.  Where  are  our  Websters  and 
Clays  and  Patrick  Henrys?" 

Where,  oh,  where? 

"Do  you  think  you  could  make  an  orator  out 
of  me?" 

He  should  have  been  stricken  dead  for  the 
impiety,  but  she  had  rewarded  him  with  a 
smile. 

"With  guidance  you  could  accomplish  any 
thing.  But  you  must  take  a  vow  never  to  lower 
your  standards,  never  to  make  any  cheap  con 
cessions  to  life." 

He  had  vowed  it  thrice  before  the  close  of 
the  evening ;  and  ere  he  had  hunted  up  the  hat 
which  was  to  cover  his  whirling  intellect  she 
had  promised  to  tutor  him  in  forensics,  to 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  21 

teach  him  the  rudiments  of  the  Demosthenean 
art.  And  as  they  shook  hands  in  that  exalted 
first  good-by  she  had  presented  him  with  the 
textbook  which  was  to  be  his  testament. 

Its  title  in  full  was  Platform  Elegance;  or 
First  Steps  in  Forensics.  It  was  written  about 
1873  by  a  genius  of  Dyak  University  who  had 
spent  his  life  classifying  all  the  human  emo 
tions  and  framing  them  in  a  series  of  compli 
cated  charts.  The  emotions,  it  seems,  were 
seven,  but  each  of  the  seven  had  from  nine  to 
ninety  subemotions.  There  was  a  right-hand 
and  left-hand  gesture  for  each  emotion,  with 
a  set  of  attitudes  and  grimaces  attached  there 
to.  For  instance,  if  one  wished  to  express 
hatred  one  clenched  the  right  fist — Gesture 
Twelve — and  while  lifting  the  elbow  to  an  an 
gle  of  forty-five  degrees,  advanced  the  right 
foot,  slightly  bending  the  knee,  at  the  same 
time  retarding  the  left  shoulder  and  tighten 
ing  the  facial  muscles  to  the  diabolical  expres 
sion  illustrated  in  Cut  Forty-six.  Platform 
Elegance  was  enriched  by  numerous  steel  en 
gravings  showing  the  model  orator — a  young 
man  with  side  whiskers,  abundant  hair,  and  a 
face  quite  pallid  with  all  the  emotions  and  sub- 
emotions  mentioned  in  the  charts. 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


He  had  gone  to  Carlotta  almost  daily  during 
this  enchanted  month  ;  they  had  sat  together  in 
her  father's  smugly  classic  library,  where  un 
der  an  enlarged  photograph  of  the  ruined  Par 
thenon  she  had  gracefully  demonstrated  her  art 
—  the  all  but  forgotten  art  of  public  speaking. 
He  learned  to  handle  his  "a's"  broadly,  not  to 
speak  them  out  as  uncultured  persons  do;  he 
learned  that  "duty"  should  be  pronounced 
"dyeuty";  but  principally  he  learned  that  the 
very  breath  of  greatness  came,  well-poised, 
from  those  finely  turned  lips.  She  sometimes 
looked  at  him  in  such  a  way  —  it  was  as  though 
a  marble  goddess  had  leaned  from  her  pedestal 
and  whispered  :  "Mortal,  thou  shalt  be  mine  !" 

"Wednesday  night  you  must  be  at  the  debat 
ing  society,"  she  had  commanded  a  few  ses 
sions  ago.  He  had  been  saying  good  after 
noon  in  the  little  hallway  and  there  had  been 
something  lingeringly  significant  about  it. 
Chester  knew  next  to  nothing  about  these  girl 
things.  Sometimes  she  made  him  quite  nerv 
ous.  "I  am  to  lead  in  the  negative.  After  the 
regular  debate  there  will  be  fifteen  minutes  of 
informal  discussion  for  beginners." 

"I  —  I've  got  to  have  something  to  talk  about, 
haven't  I  ?"  he  had  asked  f  alteringly. 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  23 

"Not  necessarily.  It's  the  drill  you  need — 
thinking  on  your  feet." 

"Of  course/' 

"Surely  it  will  not  be  hard  for  you  to  formu 
late  deductions  from  the  ideas  you  will  hear." 

"Surely  it  will  not,"  had  parroted  the  candi 
date  for  rostrum  honors. 

His  thumb  had  brushed  her  fingers  as  she 
was  reaching  out  for  the  doorknob. 

"Could  I  have  the  honor  of  escorting  you 
there  to  the — oh,  you  know — Adelphi  Hall  on 
Wednesday  ?" 

"I  should  be  delighted,  I  am  sure." 

And  here  it  was,  Wednesday. 

His  moonlit  walk  toward  Faculty  Row  had 
now  taken  him  as  far  as  the  broad  concrete 
walk  facing  the  sawed-off  Doric  beauties  of 
the  museum.  Above  him  the  four  tall  statues 
loomed  in  the  elf  light.  Chester  A.  Framm 
paused  and  permitted  his  fame-aspiring  eyes 
to  linger  upon  the  bearded,  metallic,  thin-robed 
gentleman  whom  history  called  Demosthenes 
and  whom  the  student  body  miscalled  Gazabo. 
Demosthenes !  How  the  white  hero  shimmered 
under  the  glimpses  of  the  moon,  fingering  a 
sculptured  scroll — doubtless  the  notes  from 
which  he  spoke — the  while  his  long,  spare 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


forearm  forever  extended  itself  into  an  imita 
tion  of  Gesture  Eighteen,  Platform  Elegance. 

"Immortality!" 

Chester  A.  Framm  said  this  aloud,  and 
blushed  at  the  sound  of  his  own  voice.  Little 
clouds  were  flying  across  the  moon;  flying 
souls,  they  seemed,  hymning  together  the 
greatness  of  the  spirit.  Starkly  stood  Demos 
thenes  upon  his  dizzy  roof  edge,  poised  as 
though  just  about  to  make  a  few  choice  re 
marks  in  behalf  of  the  people  of  Megalopolis; 
which  would  have  benefited  little  an  under 
graduate  who  had  barely  struggled  through 
that  paragraph  in  Xenophon  which  confesses 
that  of  Darius  and  Pary  satis  gignontai  paides 
duo. 

"Speak!"  whispered  Chester  A.  Framm. 

But  the  father  of  all  spellbinders  responded 
not  to  the  invitation.  The  divine  lips  were 
stony,  the  divine  throat  was  never  cleared. 
Possibly  the  lofty  Demosthenes  was  waiting 
to  be  introduced  by  Homer,  who  stood  at  his 
right  in  an  attitude  which  was  distinctly  presi 
dential.  Still  the  immortals  held  their  peace. 

Under  the  electric  lamp  which  spot-lighted 
the  walk  leading  from  Syle's  Dormitory  for 
Ladies  a  distinctly  feminine  giggle  insulted  the 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  25 

rich  silence.  Three  figures  sauntered  into  the 
radiance.  Two  of  them  were  swaggeringly 
male,  but  the  center  one,  which  was  slight, 
short  and  female,  was  topped  by  a  red  tam-o'- 
shanter  from  under  which  many  light  sounds 
like  thrush  notes  and  parrot  calls  rippled, 
squawked,  annoyed. 

"Regular  candy  pig!"  she  trilled;  and  her 
hand  was  seen  to  snatch,  catlike,  at  a  confec 
tionery  box  which  her  right-side  escort  held. 
"Old.  sugar  gobbler!" 

"Haw,  Floss !"  bawled  a  large  booby,  whom 
Chester,  disgustedly  huddled  among  the  foli 
age,  recognized  as  an  athlete  of  no  account. 
"Wait  till  I  send  you  a  real  box  from  San 
Francisco." 

"It  would  nev-er,  nev-er  be  the  same,"  she 
was  drawling  in  her  baby  voice. 

Birdlike  she  perked  her  small  head  from  side 
to  side,  and  under  the  artificial  light  her  eyes 
sparkled  like  mischievous  jewels. 

"Nev-er,  nev-er  the  same.    Would  it,  Spig?" 

He  whom  she  addressed  as  Spig  proved  to  be 
one  Ramon  de  Silva,  a  Californian  of  Spanish 
ancestry,  who  idled  and  frivoled  with  the 
Gamma  Gammas  and  sometimes  wrote  athletic 
notes  for  the  papers.  Undergraduate  usage 


26  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

had  tagged  him  The  Spiggoty.  The  Spiggoty 
seemed  far  less  cheerful  than  the  candy  pig, 
for  as  the  group  swung  closer  to  Chester's 
leafy  ambush  the  Spaniard's  somber  eyes  with 
the  lampblack  fringes  and  single  line  of  hairy 
brow  revealed  themselves  as  melancholy  in  the 
extreme. 

"Would  it  ev-er  be  the  same  ?"  she  persisted, 
turning  her  red  tarn  toward  The  Spiggoty's 
total  eclipse. 

"Candy's  never  quite  the  same  after  you've 
eaten  it." 

"I  believe  he's  mad  at  me,"  chirped  she  whom 
they  called  Floss. 

By  now  the  three  were  passing  so  close  that 
Chester  was  obliged  to  step  into  the  damp 
weeds  to  permit  their  transit.  He  could  not 
disregard  the  pompon  on  her  red  Tam-o'-Shan- 
ter,  that  trifle  being  level  with  his  nose. 

"Oh !"  Red  Tam-o'-Shanter  had  caught  a 
glimpse  of  his  pallid  face  among  the  leaves. 
"Did  you  see  what  I  saw?  Somebody's  look 
ing  at  the  Iron  Men.  I  hope  he  doesn't  steal 
anything.  If  he  should  walk  away  with  poor 
old  Gazabo " 

The  rest  was  drowned  in  booby  roars  of  ad 
miration.  Chester's  last  impression  was  of 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  27 

clacking  French  heels  that  seemed  to  dance  as 
they  went.  She  was  a  dancing  creature,  this 
interloper. 

"Rats !"  growled  fame's  acolyte,  and  took  a 
round-about  lane  toward  Faculty  Row.  Ches 
ter  A.  Framm,  dreaming  of  the  gods,  had 
stumbled  into  a  comedy  of  insect  lift. 

It  was  seven-thirty  when  he  reached  the 
bleak  gentility  of  Faculty  Row  and  called  for 
Miss  Carlotta  Beam.  He  was  a  little  early,  it 
turned  out,  and  Professor  Beam  as  he  came  out 
of  the  dining  room  was  chewing.  For  the 
first  time  it  was  manifest  that  the  faculty,  like 
mortals,  eat  food.  The  professor  offered  a 
ceremonious  hand  and  with  the  assurance  that 
Carlotta  would  presently  appear  returned  to 
his  cabbage.  Dishes  clattered  behind  drawn 
doors.  Fervently  Chester  hoped  that  they 
didn't  compel  a  wonderful  girl  like  Carlotta  to 
wash  dishes. 

True  to  her  father's  promise,  Carlotta  did 
presently  appear.  She  must  have  scurried  up 
stairs  by  a  rear  way,  for  she  entered  majes 
tically  from  the  front  stairway.  She  seemed 
terrifyingly  formal  and  was  wearing  a  fur-col 
lared  cloak  which  Chester  was  sure  he  had  seen 
on  Mrs.  Beam. 


28  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Half  the  way  over  to  Adelphi  Hall  Chester's 
attention  was  centered  on  his  right  elbow, 
which  he  had  crooked  like  the  handle  of  a  jug 
in  the  event  that  Miss  Beam  might  see  fit  to 
take  his  arm.  It  was  the  demand  of  etiquette, 
he  knew,  that  a  lady  and  gentleman  should 
walk  forth  so  linked.  But  Miss  Beam  remained 
obtuse.  She  chattered  harmoniously  on  the 
topics  of  the  day;  Chester  had  no  ears  for  the 
music.  His  arm  was  becoming  numb  from  the 
wrist  to  the  shoulder  blade.  At  last  he  became 
aware  that  she  had  paused  in  her  monologue 
and  was  asking  him  a  question. 

"What  was  that?"  he  inquired,  straighten 
ing  out  his  elbow  and  experiencing  immediate 
relief. 

"Are  your  familiar  with  Robert's  Rules  of 
Order?" 

"Why,  no.  I  didn't  get  that  far  in  the 
book." 

"It's  not  in  the  book,"  she  informed  him 
more  coolly  than  he  liked. 

He  found  his  mind  straying — seeing  red 
with  a  pompon  on  top,  and  annoying,  yellowish 
eyes  dancing  below.  He  wondered  if  it  had 
gone  out  of  style  for  girls  to  take  people's 
arms. 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  29 

"This  is  my  first  try/*  he  grunted.  "Maybe 
I'd  just  better  sit  and  watch." 

"By  no  means!"  There  was  no  appeal 
against  that  decision.  "You've  begun  none  too 
early.  I  merely  wished  to  warn  you  of  one  of 
the  rules.  When  the  informal  discussion  be 
gins  several  people  will  probably  rise  and  ask 
for  the  floor.  You  must  wait  till  you  are  rec 
ognized." 

"I  know  that,"  said  Chester  rather  shortly. 
"That's  the  way  they  do  at  the  class  meet 
ings." 

"Splendid !"  chimed  the  superlative  Carlotta ; 
which  so  cheered  his  heart  that  he  ceased  car 
ing  whether  she  had  taken  his  arm  or  not. 

A  number  of  students  were  crowding  in 
when  they  entered  the  hall,  and  Chester's  first 
vision  in  that  temple  of  thundering  eloquence 
was  of  a  life-size  oil  painting  which  hung  over 
the  rostrum.  It  was  a  portrait  of  William  H. 
Barbour,  eminent  jurist,  once  a  presidential 
candidate,  and  known  in  Dyak  as  donor  of  the 
Barbour  Oratorial  Medal.  The  aspirant's 
heart  sank  another  notch  when  he  saw  that  the 
audience  was  about  equally  divided  between 
the  serious  thinkers  and  the  lighter  set  of  the 
college.  Which  of  the  two  he  had  more  to  fear 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


he  knew  not  at  that  moment.  Later  he  found 
out. 

"Sit  here,"  whispered  his  spiritual  guide, 
pointing  to  a  vacant  chair  halfway  down  the 
aisle.  He  sank  weakly  into  the  place  she  had 
chosen  for  him  and  saw  her  settle  herself 
among  the  speakers  of  the  evening  in  the  row 
nearest  the  platform.  The  chairman  was  a 
lean,  tall  Scot  whose  clan  name,  McNabb,  had 
been  shortened  by  the  lighter  set  to  the  con 
venient  monosyllable  Gabb.  Freshmen  were 
shoving  into  the  back  seats.  The  lofty  Gabb 
strode  to  his  place  on  the  platform  and  rapped 
resoundingly.  The  air  was  vibrant  with  doom. 

'The  meeting  will  please  come  to  order !" 

Was  it  a  coincidence?  At  the  instant  the 
gavel  dropped  and  the  words  were  spoken  Red 
Tam-o'-Shanter  came  dancing  in  under  an  in 
creased  convoy  of  adorers.  Apparently  she 
was  playing  fraternity  against  fraternity,  for 
she  had  added  Kappa  Kappas  to  Gamma  Gam 
mas,  and  in  the  rear  straggled  The  Spiggoty, 
jealously  glowering. 

"Oh,  I  didn't  think  we'd  be  so  conspicuous/' 
she  giggled  over  the  hush. 

There  were  eight  vacant  seats  right  in  front 
of  the  place  where  Miss  Beam  had  set  her 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  31 

Chester.  Red  Tam-o'-Shanter  snuggled  in  be 
tween  two  gigantic  Gammas,  while  Ramon  de 
Silva,  who  was  not  athletic,  occupied  an  end 
chair  and  turned  pale  with  disappointed  am 
bition. 

It  was  not  until  the  exercises  began  that  Red 
Tarn  changed  from  a  mild  annoyance  to  an 
active  nuisance.  All  was  dignity  with  the  ex 
ception  of  this  Floss  thing.  On  a  front  row, 
one  finger  supporting  her  expansive  brow,  Miss 
Beam  sat  in  concentrated  reflection;  Gabb  the 
chairman  rose,  and  though  he.  had  an  accor 
dion-plaited  face  which  he  alternately  bunched 
together  and  pulled  out  as  he  spoke  of  the  treas 
urer's  report  no  normal  Adelphian  wouiv}  have 
considered  this  fair  fruit  for  satire. 

But  he  had  no  sooner  opened  his  collapsible 
countenance  than  a  smothered  giggle  from  the 
row  just  ahead  deflected  Chester's  attention* 
It  seemed  that  Red  Tarn  was  giving  one  of  her 
apparently  inimitable  imitations.  The  subject 
of  her  sketch  was  quite  apparently  Mr. 
McNabb.  She  did  it  with  her  hands.  She  pre 
tended  to  be  playing  an  accordion  accompani 
ment  to  the  speaker's  words.  Every  time  the 
face  of  Gabb  closed  up  she  would  bring  her 
hands  together;  when  it  lengthened  out  she 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


would  pull  them  rapturously  apart,  her  little 
ringers  going  busily  over  imaginary  keys.  The 
two  big  Gammas  were  rocking  with  joy.  The 
dark-browed  Gamma,  out  in  the  cold,  permit 
ted  himself  a  nervous  smile. 

"Cheese  it,  Floss!"  gleefully  warned  her 
right-hand  lummox.  "We'll  all  be  chucked." 

"I  don't  care,  do  you?"  responded  the  mu 
sician.  "Wait  till  Hazzie  reads  the  minutes  of 
the  meeting  -  " 

"Dod  gast  it!"  muttered  Chester.  "If  she 
does  that  when  I'm  speaking  -  " 

But  the  behavior  of  this  Floss  during  the 
treasurer's  report  was  of  such  a  nature  as  to 
warrant  a  rebuke.  Chester  fidgeted  as  long  as 
he  could,  then  he  leaned  toward  the  scarlet 
headdress.  He  was  tall  enough  to  look  over 
her  shoulder,  and  while  he  was  hestitating  for 
words  he  spied  that  which  turned  his  annoy 
ance  to  a  sort  of  panic  fear.  She  was  wearing 
flowers  —  an  exaggerated  bunch  of  marguer 
ites.  Chester's  hands  grew  cold  as  along  the 
base  of  his  nose  there  passed  a  tickling  itching 
thrill.  Marguerites!  The  very  thought  of 
those  flowers,  which  had  always  spelled  hay 
fever  for  him,  sickened  his  soul,  brought  swift 
tears  of  influenza  to  his  eyes.  His  mother  had 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  33 

been  right.  That  box  of  Ajax  Hay  Fever 
Balm 

He  huddled  himself  back,  as  far  as  possible 
away  from  the  menace.  Desperately  his  eyes 
sought  the  rows  of  chairs.  Not  an  empty  seat 
in  the  hall.  The  place  was  packed  to  the  doors. 
The  agony  of  self-control  kept  his  mind  off  the 
rostrum;  but  he  was  quite  unable  to  restrain 
an  occasional  glance  in  the  direction  of  that 
being  whom  he  so  passionately  longed  to  kill. 
Strands  of  honey-colored  hair  showed  under 
the  red  tarn;  her  complexion  was  high  and 
clear,  like  that  of  a  child  who  has  been  playing 
in  the  wind;  once  she  turned  her  impudent 
glances  far  enough  for  him  to  see  her  eyes, 
which  were  bright  gray  with  little  golden 
flecks  across  the  irises.  How  pretty  she  was; 
and  how  unspeakable! 

At  some  indefinite  point  of  time  he  heard  ap 
plause  and  was  aware  that  the  cocksure  affirm 
ative  had  got  down  to  give  the  negative  a 
chance.  Chairman  McNabb  unfolded  himself 
to  announce  that  Miss  Carlotta  Beam  would 
next  be  heard  from.  Chester's  sympathetic 
heart  stood  still.  Carlotta  laid  aside  her  cloak 
and  undulated  to  the  rostrum — saffron  clad, 
serene,  indifferent  of  fate.  She  brought  her 


8* THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

right  hand,  half  closed,  to  her  breast  in  a  ges 
ture  she  had  learned  at  a  Delsarte  school  two 
seasons  before.  The  room  lay  in  a  hush. 

Red  Tarn  was  heard  distinctly  to  clear  her 
throat.  Chester  held  his  gaze  toward  the  plat 
form,  but  something  told  him  that  Flossie  had 
struck  that  very  pose,  and  that  Gamma  and 
Kappa  were  equally  enthralled. 

Words  of  wisdom  flowed  from  a  deep  well- 
pitched  voice  where  every  "a"  stood  out  broad 
and  splendid,  every  paragraph  enjoyed  the  ad 
vantage  of  a  full  stop.  As  winner  of  the  Wil 
liam  H.  Barbour  prize  of  last  year  Miss  Beam 
held  an  advantage  over  lesser  orators  and 
showed  it.  She  began  with  a  simile  of  Pe 
gasus  and  worked  easily  into  the  legend  of 
Abraham  Lincoln  and  the  pine-knot  fire.  Ches 
ter's  thoughts  flew  rapidly  to  the  subject  of 
himself. 

"And  before  I  close,  Mister  Chairman,  ladies 
and  gentlemen,  permit  me  to  repeat  that  appli 
cation  is  but  the  work  of  man  while  genius  is 
given  to  us  by  the  grace  of  God.  Application 
is  merely  the  wick  by  which  the  light  is  thrown, 
genius  is  the  oil  which " 

The  chairman's  gavel  came  down.  It  was 
evident  that  she  had  overtalked  her  time.  Ches- 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS 35 

ter  thought  he  heard  a  voice  say  "Coal  oil." 
Was  it  that  awful  Red  Tam-o'-Shanter  ?  It 
didn't  so  much  matter  then,  because  an  idea 
had  leaped  full  grown  from  his  skull;  one  of 
those  dangerous  things  by  which  reputations 
are  made  or  shattered  at  a  stroke.  Little  he 
cared  then  for  the  rest  of  the  debate;  Chester 
sat  rapt  in  contemplation — possibly  he  would 
not  be  able  to  get  out  the  whole  idea  within 
the  three  minutes  allotted  to  such  as  him  ac 
cording  to  the  rules. 

The  seconds  finished  and  the  principals 
leaped  to  the  rebuttal.  Even  the  precious 
words  of  Miss  Carlotta  Beam  were  wasted  on 
her  admirer,  who  crouched  as  though  for  a 
spring. 

He  had  quite  forgotten  the  Red  Tam  and  her 
talent  for  discord. 

Carlotta  sat  down  at  last.  Then  there  fell 
an  awful  hush  during  which  several  officious 
ladies  and  gentlemen  rose  and  filed  into  an 
anteroom. 

The  collapsible  Gabb  unfolded  his  face  to 
announce:  "While  the  judges  are  retiring  to 
formulate  their  decision  the  rules  permit  of 
an  informal  discussion  from  the  floor. 
Each  speaker  is  limited  to  three  minutes.  If 


36  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

there  are  any  members  who  wish  to  speak " 

"Mister  Chairman!" 

Several  new  members  had  come  to  standing 
postures  in  various  parts  of  the  room,  but  Ches 
ter  A.  Framm  seemed  to  have  leaped  halfway 
to  the  chandeliers  in  the  wildness  of  his  at 
tack.  Other  voices  were  clamoring,  but  the 
distracted  bellow  of  the  inspirational  laundry- 
man  drowned  out  all  competitors. 

"Mr.  Framm  has  the  floor,"  decreed  the  in 
exorable  Gabb. 

Competition  thus  swept  aside  Chester  found 
himself  standing  alone  in  the  isolation  of 
greatness.  He  had  already  decided  to  employ 
Gesture  Twelve,  expressive  of  hatred,  but  in 
that  flash  of  intelligence  the  devil  in  a  tomato- 
colored  cap  caused  him  to  look  down  on  the 
little  tormentor  of  the  seat  in  front.  The  look 
of  exaggerated  interest  she  was  turning  up  to 
him  merely  added  to  his  confusion. 

He  must  have  stood  there  an  unnecessarily 
long  time,  for  he  heard  Gabb's  generous  offer 
repeated  through  the  room:  "You  have  the 
floor,  Mr.  Framm." 

The  aspirant  still  stood,  mentally  thumbing 
the  pages  of  Platform  Elegance.  Should  he 
employ  the  gesture  described  in  Cut  Eighteen 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  37 

as  Remorse  or  Pity?  In  a  sort  of  panic  he 
brought  his  hands  to  the  proper  position,  but 
in  the  urgency  of  the  moment  clenched  his  fist 
quaveringly  in  an  imitation  of  Cut  Forty-six, 
descriptive  of  hatred.  His  arm  came  up  to  a 
stiff  right  angle;  an  unhappy  impulse  caused 
him  to  glance  again  at  the  girl  in  front.  She, 
too,  had  brought  her  arm  up  to  a  stiff  right 
angle. 

Chester  A.  Framm  saw  red,  but  maddened 
by  the  thought  that  something  must  be  said 
and  that  immediately,,  he  opened  the  floodgates 
and  roared:  "Ladies  and  gentlemen,  enthusi 
asm  are  not " 

He  paused,  cold  with  the  fear  that  his  audi 
ence  was  not  with  him. 

"If  it  aren't,  what  are  it?"  came  a  still  small 
voice  right  under  his  ear.  *•*•"• — — ' •!&*£$ 

"Enthusiasm,"  he  resumed  in  a  desperate 
bellow,  "is  not  the  normal  state  of  man." 

With  that  he  resumed  his  chair — or  would 
have  resumed  it  had  not  the  chair  turned 
traitor  and  slid  out  from  under  him,  permitting 
Chester  to  take  his  seat  heartily  on  the  floor. 
Adelphi  howled.  Above  the  storm  the  gavel 
sounded  like  the  blows  of  a  hammer  on  a  cof 
fin  lid.  Blinded  with  his  shame  the  boy  orator 


38 THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

got  up  and  got  out;  but  not  too  soon  to  hear 
Red  Tarn's  appreciative  comment: 

"Isn't  he  fun-ny?  Went  off  like  a  regular 
old  alarm  clock.  I  wonder  who  ever  told  him 
he  could  make  a  speech?" 

Once  in  the  open  air  Chester  hugged  a  Doric 
column  until  the  meeting  broke  up,  and  he 
could  at  last  pick  out  Miss  Beam  chatting  eas 
ily  in  a  setting  of  serious-minded  students, 

"What  happened  to  you  ?"  was  her  very  nat 
ural  question  as  soon  as  he  got  her  disentan 
gled.  The  fact  that  she  took  his  arm  added 
a  little  warmth. 

"I  got  started  all  right,"  he  lamely  apolo 
gized  to  his  instructress.  "And  then  that  Floss 
girl " 

"She's  been  a  disturbing  influence  ever  since 
she  came  to  college!"  Carlotta  informed  him 
with  nearer  a  show  of  temper  than  he  had  ever 
before  seen  in  her.  "Girls  like  Florabel  Bran- 
non  take  all  the  dignity  out  of  coeducation. 
Last  Wednesday  in  English  2-B  she  told  father 
that  she  thought  the  Decameron  was  Scott's 
best  novel.  She  insisted  that  it  must  be  by 
Scott  because  Decameron  was  such  a  Scottish 
word.  Fancy ! 

"Please  overlook  her.     She  won't  be  here 


LIFE  ON  OLYMPUS  39 

long.  And  don't  let  yourself  be  discouraged. 
Demosthenes,  you  know,  started  with  a  pebble 
under  his  tongue." 

"A  pebble!"  he  groaned.  "I  swallowed  a 
sand  wagon  I" 

But  he  was  ever  so  grateful  to  her  just  the 
same. 

"You  have  something  over  two  months  to 
prepare  for  the  Barbour  medal  contest,"  she 
said  before  bidding  him  good  night  by  her  lit 
tle  jig-sawed  door. 

"You  don't  mean  to  say  I've  got  any 
chance " 

The  thought  stunned  him. 

"Why,  surely !  I  fully  intend  that  you  shall 
enter  for  the  contest  and  win  it." 

"By  ginger,  you  have  got  faith!" 

"Yes — a  great  deal — in  you,"  her  rich  con 
tralto  rolled  out  as  she  gave  him  her  hand. 

And  this  was  the  first  time  that  it  ever 
dawned  upon  Chester  A.  Framm  that  women 
are  peculiar. 

He  repeated  the  reflection,  however,  as  soon 
as  he  got  back  to  the  flat  over  the  Bon  Ton 
Laundry  and  found  his  mother,  clad  in  her  best 
widow's  frock,  waiting  for  him  under  the  lamp. 

"Where  in  the  world  have  you  been?"  he 


40  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

asked,  for  never  before  in  his  college  days  had 
he  seen  her  in  formal  costume. 

"To  the  Adelphi  meetin',"  she  told  him.  "I 
stood  up  for  hours  a-waiting  for  you  to  begin. 
I  just  told  you  to  take  that  box  of  Ajax  Salve." 

Chester  groaned  and  went  to  bed.  Neither 
Ajax  nor  Helen  could  salve  his  wound. 

But  he  was  no  sooner  between  the  sheets 
than  she  came  to  him,  intent  upon  the  maternal 
process  known  as  tucking  in.  It  always  made 
Chester  feel  like  a  freshman. 

"That  Carlotta  Beam  is  a  smart  girl,"  she 
insisted.  "Sort  of  wonderful  and  full  of  brains. 
I  bet  she'll  make  a  President  of  the  United 
States  out  of  the  man  she  marries." 

"I  shouldn't  wonder/'  agreed  Chester,  his 
thoughts  already  wandering  toward  possibili 
ties. 

"Not  one  of  them  cigareet-smoking  chits 
with  circus  clothes.  No,  sir-ree !" 

"She's  different,"  said  Chester,  hoping  his 
mother  would  leave  him  alone  and  permit  him 
to  follow  the  glowing  progress  of  his  dreams. 

"I  wonder  if  she  ain't  just  a  mite  older  than 
you?"  The  son  made  no  response;  therefore 
the  mother  went  out  and  closed  the  door  softly 
after  her. 


CHAPTER  II 

AN  ANNOYANCE 

How  Carlotta  Beam  did  have  faith  in  Ches 
ter  A.  Framm  and  did  coach  and  groom  him  to 
the  point  of  perfection  whereby  he  was  able  to 
outface  fate  and  win  an  oratorical  medal — one 
of  those  solid-gold  trophies  as  big  as  a  dinner 
plate  and  engraved  with  laurel  wreaths  in  high 
relief — constitutes  nothing  more  than  a  climac 
teric  point  in  a  college  career.  And  since  col 
lege  days  bear  but  a  faint  resemblance  to  real 
life  the  oratorical  medal  is  entitled  to  merely 
a  semicolon's  worth  in  the  history  of  Chester 
A.  Framm. 

Something  like  two  weeks  after  the  Adelphi 
fiasco  he  came  again  into  actual  contact  with 
that  pestiferous  Red  Tam-o'-Shanter.  It  was 
a  sloppy  day,  and  Chester,  coming  round  a 
corner  of  the  old  Chemistry  Lab,  was  attempt 
ing  to  manage  a  cotton  umbrella  and  a  note 
book  with  the  same  hand.  With  every  strug 
gle  to  open  the  umbrella  he  lost  a  little  influ- 

41 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


ence  over  the  notebook,  which  had  a  slippery 
cover  and  a  passion  for  getting  itself  lost.  At 
last  he  succeeded  in  spreading  the  canopy  over 
his  head,  but  upon  the  instant  the  sly  little 
book  popped  out  from  his  elbow  and  landed 
plump  in  a  coffee-colored  pool  beside  the  path. 

"You've  lost  your  notes,  Mr.  Cicero,"  came 
a  nai've  treble  out  of  the  bole  of  an  ancient  live 
oak  by  the  corner. 

He  tilted  his  umbrella  and  got  the  drip  down 
his  collar  as  he  leaped  to  one  side  and  beheld 
the  wet  little  dryad  of  the  oak.  Red  Tarn,  af 
ter  the  manner  of  chameleons,  had  turned  to 
green;  or,  to  be  more  explicit,  Miss  Brannon 
was  wearing  a  greenish  waterproof  creation 
with  just  one  rubbery  yellowish  flower  above 
the  brim. 

"Thank  you/'  said  he  haughtily,  groping 
with  his  hat  as  he  leaned  down  to  salvage  the 
wreck. 

But  as  he  was  shaking  out  its  dripping  cov 
ers,  what  should  this  Flossie  do  but  come  over 
and  take  it  away  from  him. 

"If  you  turn  it  that  way,"  she  said,  "the  mud 
gets  inside.  And  then  who  can  tell  what  great 
big  thoughts  will  be  all  gummed  together !" 

As  she  was  only  a  girl,  and  a  small  one  at 


AN  ANNOYANCE 43 

that,  Chester  could  neither  hit  her  nor  swear 
aloud.  So  he  stood  in  the  wet  and  watched  her 
deft  little  fingers  as  she  tore  a  shred  of  paper 
from  a  damp  candy  box  and  set  about  drying 
the  notebook.  It  was  one  of  those  irritating 
situations  in  which  an  enemy  offers  a  spoonful 
of  good  to  indemnify  a  continent  of  evil. 

"There,"  she  smiled — oh,  so  adorably! — as 
she  gave  it  back  to  him.  "And  now  you  aren't 
going  to  offer  me  half  of  your  umbrella  or 
anything  as  far  as  Miss  Thompkins'  ?" 

"Ah.  May  I  have  the  pleasure?"  he  asked, 
stiffly  changing  the  umbrella  to  a  sheltering  po 
sition. 

"If  you  call  it  a  pleasure,"  she  said;  and  got 
very  close  to  him  under  the  cotton  eaves  before 
informing  him:  "Umbrellas  are  a  joke — un 
less  you're  in  love." 

"Oh." 

He  looked  shyly  down  at  that  mobile,  flash 
ing  little  face  and  wondered  what  she  was  driv 
ing  at.  Was  she  hinting  that  he  turn  the  um 
brella  over  to  her  ? 

"Of  course  you've  never  been  in  love." 
Something  about  her  inspired  him  to  this  im 
pertinence. 

"Me?"    She  gave  one  of  those  awful  little 


44  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

trills.  "About  a  hundred  and  twenty  times,  I 
guess." 

He  strode  grimly  along,  carefully  manipulat 
ing  the  umbrella  so  as  to  keep  her  dry. 

"I  bet  you're  a  noble  character,"  said  she 
after  a  while. 

"Why?" 

"You're  letting  the  cutest  waterfall  run  onto 
your  hat — all  on  account  of  poor  little  me." 

He  adjusted  the  handle  in  such  a  way  that 
poor  little  she  should  get  her  share  of  rain  af 
ter  that. 

"You're  not  really  truly  awfully  mad  at  me, 
are  you?"  she  chirped  as  soon  as  they  had  got 
halfway  down  the  path.  He  felt  uncomfort 
ably  like  The  Spiggoty,  whom  he  had  over 
heard  fuming  at  the  same  question. 

"Why  should  I  be?"  he  asked,  looking  down 
from  his  exalted  plane. 

Her  eyes,  he  found,  were  neither  gray  nor 
yellow.  Gold  dust  had  been  spilled  into  liquid 
crystal.  Her  nose  was  slightly  snubbed.  She 
had  prankish  eyebrows,  tweaking  up  at  the  cor 
ners. 

"  'Course  you  shouldn't,"  she  was  quick  to 
respond.  "I  always  go  to  the  debating  society 
because  it's  more  fun  than  amateur  night  And 


AN  ANNOYANCE  45 

say — you  were  wonderful !  Your  arm  went  up 
like  a  traveling  crane,  and  then  the  steam  drill 
started  in.  Oh,  you  Cicero !" 

"If  I  afforded  you  amusement  I  feel  myself 
fully  repaid,"  he  assured  her. 

"I  knew  you  would !"  she  chimed.  "It's  just 
what  I've  been  thinking  about  you." 

"About  me?" 

"Oh,  yes !  I  think  about  ev-erybody."  She 
gave  him  a  stare  which  at  that  moment  was  as 
blank  and  as  innocent  as  a  baby's. 

"What  have  you  been  thinking  about  me?" 
A  little  shutter  in  his  heart  had  come  loose  and 
was  flapping. 

"I  think  you're  a  great  big  noble  grand 
man,"  she  eulogized.  "You  wouldn't  mind 
anything  I  could  do  any  more  than  a  splendid 
iron  statue  would  get  mad  at  the  katydids  skip 
ping  round  it  having  a  good  time." 

"Are  you  laughing  at  me?'* 

"Cross  my  heart." 

No  crease  of  mirth  was  apparent  upon  those 
wonderful  cheeks,  sweeter  by  far  than  Hybla's 
honeyed  roses.  This  seemed  a  fair  moment  in 
which  to  say  his  say  with  her. 

"There  are  things  in  life,"  he  began,  "much 
more  important  than  having  a  good  time." 


46  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Oh,  is  there  ?"she  asked,  her  eyes  widening 
to  a  look  of  wonder. 

"Yes,  there  is — are,  I  mean/' 

"You  always  get  your  'is's'  and  your  'are's' 
twisted,  don't  you !"  This  time  her  giggle  was 
unmistakable. 

He  shut  up  like  a  clam.  Whereupon  she 
snuggled  very  close  against  his  wet  sleeve. 

"What's  more  important  than  having  a  good 
time?"  she  coaxed;  and  Chester  was  truly 
frightened  by  the  heady  sensation  it  gave  him. 

"Well,"  said  he,  "there's  ambition." 

"Oh,  I  forgot  about  Napoleon,"  was  the  way 
she  took  it.  "What's  your  ambition,  Mr.  Ci 
cero?" 

Despite  the  implied  insult  he  stuck  to  it. 

"I'm  going  in  for  a  public  career." 

"Sure.  I  know — one  of  those  great  big 
howling  whooping  orators  like  Horace  Greel- 
ey " 

"Horace  Greeley  was  a  journalist,"  he  cor 
rected  her. 

"I  always  mix  up  my  historical  heroes,"  she 
told  him  with  the  little-girl  humility  of  which 
she  was  capable.  "I  haven't  got  any  mind. 
But  I  know  what  you  mean.  Oratory  is  won 
derful.  There  was  a  gentleman  lived  next  to 


Or^o^, 


"YOU'VE  LOST  YOUR  NOTES,  MR.  CICER( 


AN  ANNOYANCE 47 

us  in  town.  He  drank.  On  Saturday  nights — 
rain  or  shine — he'd  get  full  on  Bourbon  and 
begin  orating.  My  Cousin  Nannie  and  I  used 
to  perch  out  on  the  veranda  roof  listening  to 
him.  He  was  splendid — especially  when  he  got 
profane.  It  was  per-fectly  delicious  until  one 
night  he  thought  he  was  Julius  Caesar,  put  on  a 
nightshirt  and  crawled  out  on  the  roof  and  be 
gan Hello.  Why,  here  we  are  at  Miss 

Thompkins'." 

Sure  enough,  they  were.  Chester  found 
himself  at  the  gate,  actually  shaking  hands  with 
her  and  lingering  as  he  shook.  He  wondered 
what  Carlotta  would  say,  if  anything. 

"You're  in  the  laundry  business,  aren't 
you  ?"  inquired  the  remarkable  being,  bringing 
the  thought  out  of  the  nowhere.  Chester's 
neck  grew  hot  with  a  sudden  flush. 

"Yes.    That  is,  temporarily " 

"Until  you  can  move  into  the  Hall  of  Fame. 
I  don't  see  any  reason  why  you  should  be 
ashamed  of  it." 

"Who's  ashamed  of  it?"  he  asked  with  inele 
gant  directness. 

"I  should  think  the  laundry  business  would 
be  great.  The  Chinese  think  of  all  the  fine 
things  first.  If  I  had  a  business  like  that  I'd 


48  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

work  it  up  into  the  wholesale  and  be  the  biggest 
laundryman  in  the  world,  bar  none.  Say,  can 
you  blow  water  through  your  teeth  onto  the 
shirts  the  way  the  Chinamen  do  ?"  Getting  no 
encouraging  response  she  went  right  on :  "I'd 
rather  be  a  crackajack  laundryman  than  Shake- 
spere  or  any  other  of  those  tin  statues  on  top 
of  the  museum." 

"Shakespere  isn't  on  top  of  the  museum/' 
he  corrected  her  again. 

"He  ought  to  be/'  said  she ;  and  by  the  way 
she  said  it  it  was  easy  to  infer  that  she  re 
garded  the  museum  as  a  storehouse  for  dis 
carded  reputations. 

"I'm  pleased  to  meet  you,"  he  fumbled. 

"I  bet  I  know  exactly  what's  the  matter  with 
you,"  she  insisted,  holding  on  to  his  hand. 

"Matter  with  me?" 

"Yeah.  You  never  have  any  fun  after 
dark." 

"Don't  I?"    He  had  never  thought  of  that, 

"This  college  is  a  morgue.  I've  flunked  in 
four  subjects  this  week  and  if  I  stick  another 
month  it's  because  God  loves  the  Irish.  If  I 
go  home  now  Aunt  Het'll  tie  a  flatiron  to  my 
leg  and  drop  me  in  the  bay.  She  wants  to  make 
a  school-teacher  out  of  me.  Can  you  beat  it?" 


AN  ANNOYANCE  49 

"I  can't/'  he  heartily  agreed. 

"I  tell  you  what  let's  do — why  don't  you 
come  round  to-night  and  pretend  you're  help 
ing  me  with  my  psychology  ?" 

"To-night?"     The  prospect  was  wild. 

"Sure !  Just  stick  round  until  Miss  Thomp- 
kins  turns  the  hose  on  you." 

"I  shall  be  pleased." 

He  got  away  under  his  soggy  umbrella.  Be 
hind  the  bleachers  he  paused  and  considered 
his  case.  He  had  promised  Carlotta  to  come 
round  at  eight  with  the  first  draft  of  his  ora 
tion,  the  subject  of  which  was  to  be  William 
of  Orange. 


CHAPTER  III 


"WHO  EVER  TOLD  YOU  YOU   COULD  MAKE  A 
SPEECH  ?" 


IT  WAS  on  the  evening  of  the  twenty-seventK 
of  January  that  Chester  A.  Framm  with  the 
aid  of  Ajax  Balm  got  his  semicolon's  worth  of 
glory  in  the  shape  of  the  William  H.  Barbour 
medal,  which  when  it  was  pinned  on  by  a  loqua 
cious  dean  looked  bigger  than  a  barrel  head 
and  felt  twice  as  heavy.  For  a  full  half  hour 
he  had  thundered  on  episodes  mostly  cribbed 
from  Motley's  Dutch  Republic,  for  a  full  half 
hour  he  had  painted  the  Duke  of  Alva  as  black 
as  he  undoubtedly  was  and  the  Prince  of  Or 
ange  as  white  as  he  probably  wasn't.  Miss- 
Carlotta  Beam  had  sat  in  the  front  row  in  or 
der  to  give  him  courage.  Chester,  from  hy 
pothesis  to  conclusion,  had  kept  his  eyes  on  a 
pink  spot  in  the  balcony  which,  so  he  imagined 
it,  represented  Flossie  Brannon  in  an  evening 
gown. 

The  dean  predicted  very  fine  things  for 
50 


WHO  SAID  YOU  COULD  MAKE  A  SPEECH?  51 

Chester's  future  as  he  fastened  the  elaborately 
engraved  decoration  upon  Chester's  swelling 
breast. 

The  rostrum  smelled  of  cut  flowers,  escaping 
gas  and  sachet  powder.  The  evening  was 
pitched  in  the  highest  key  of  glory,  but  like  all 
earthly  glory  it  stunned  rather  than  exalted. 

After  the  exercises  the  faculty  gave  a  recep 
tion — think  of  it! — to  Chester  A.  Framm.  It 
was  held  in  the  college  library.  Who's  Who 
in  Dyak  assembled  to  shake  him  by  the  hand, 
and  Chester,  who  should  have  been  a  proud  and 
happy  man,  experienced  the  first  pain  of  a 
breaking  heart. 

They  were  standing  right  under  the  bust  of 
Robert  Burns,  fitting  witness  to  such  a  plight, 
and  the  young  orator  was  trying  to  look  inter 
ested  while  his  triumphant  mother  held  his 
hand,  bidding  him  listen  to  Surrogate  Judge 
Foster  and  the  Reverend  Mr.  Smiley  quarrel 
ing  over  whether  the  boy  should  go  in  for  the 
law  or  the  ministry.  Carlotta,  impressive  in 
her  white  muslin,  held  aloof  among  the  young 
instructors,  and  Chester  would  have  thanked 
her  then  and  there  for  what  she  had  done  for 
him  had  not  Mrs.  Beam  come  hissing  up  to 
gloat  like  a  cultured  vampire.  Her  changed 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


attitude  toward  Mrs.  Framm  already  indicated 
that  the  match  was  as  good  as  made. 

In  all  the  tumult  and  the  shouting  Chester's 
mind  was  not  on  his  success.  His  eyes  wan 
dered  round  the  room  seeking  that  which  was 
not  worth  worrying  over.  He  got  a  glimpse 
from  Carlotta  which  plainly  said  "Come  hith 
er/'  but  he  remained  disconsolately  between 
Mrs.  Beam  and  Mrs.  Framm,  to  be  embar 
rassed  by  the  latter's  clattering  on: 

"As  I  was  saying  to  Ike  Whittell  :  They're 
as  cozy  as  two  peas  in  a  pod,  them  two.  It 
takes  a  girl  like  Carlotta  to  bring  out  Chester's 
fine  points/  says  I  ;  and  Ike  says  -  " 

Everybody  in  Dyak  came  to  shake  hands 
with  Chester.  Everybody,  did  I  say?  Ches 
ter's  attention  continued  to  wander.  Could  it 
be  possible  that  after  the  froth  of  gossip  she 
had  whipped  up  round  the  university,  after  the 
tantalizing  dance  she  had  led  poor  Framm,  af 
ter  the  pangs  of  jealousy  she  had  created  in  the 
Beam  household  —  Flossie  Brannon  was  too  in 
different  to  his  well-being  to  show  up  ? 

He  caught  the  flash  of  her  pink  gown  at  last 
as  she  came  in  at  the  far  end  of  the  room, 
closely  followed  by  The  Spiggoty,  who  wore  a 
dinner  jacket,  as  became  a  worldly  Gamma. 


WHO  SAID  YOU  COULD  MAKE  A  SPEECH?  53 

She  never  looked  toward  the  hero  of  the  even 
ing;  Ramon  de  Silva  seemed  all  in  all  to  her  at 
that  moment.  As  though  sharing  the  sweetest 
secret  in  the  world  the  two  sauntered  through 
and  disappeared  into  the  auditorium  beyond. 
A  moment  later  the  notes  of  a  piano  throbbing 
ragtime  violated  the  dignity  of  Chester's  re 
ception. 

"Mercy!"  hissed  Mrs.  Beam.  "It's  quite 
against  the  rules." 

"It's  that  yellow-haired  hussy  again,"  in 
timated  Mrs.  Framm. 

"Ill  see  that  it's  stopped." 

Chester  volunteered  this  noble  service  and 
strode  away  toward  the  shocking  noise.  He 
had  frequented  Miss  Thompkins'  sufficiently  of 
late  and  attempted  to  outsit  de  Silva  often 
enough  to  know  The  Spiggoty's  skillful  touch 
at  the  keyboard.  From  the  great  square  piano 
behind  the  palms  his  notes  were  capering  mer 
rily,  and  through  the  exotic  foliage  Chester 
could  see  scraps  of  pink  chiffon  performing 
evolutions  quite  at  variance  with  the  rules. 
Once  behind  the  sheltering  palms  the  self-ap 
pointed  censor  saw  what  he  saw :  Flossie  was 
executing  the  cakewalk,  then  in  vogue. 


54 THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Listen  at  him,  Cicero !"  she  crowed.  "Spig's 
new  piece — The  Potato  Bugs'  Parade." 

"It's  against  the  rules,"  said  Chester  se 
verely. 

"Who  cares  for  the  rules?  I'm  fired  any 
how,"  quoth  she  caressingly.  "Let  'er  go, 
Spig!" 

"Look  here,  Framm,  on  whose  authority  are 
you  giving  orders  here?"  growled 'the  Span 
iard,  staying  his  harmonic  fingers  and  wheel 
ing  on  the  piano  stool. 

"On  the  authority  of  the  college,"  replied 
the  boy  orator. 

The  Spiggoty  had  come  to  his  feet  and  his 
beetling  brow  was  drawn  down  almost  to  the 
base  of  his  nose.  He  was  consideraly  smaller 
than  Chester.  This,  possibly,  had  saved  him 
on  several  occasions. 

"I  see."  The  Spiggoty's  teeth  were  large 
and  he  showed  them  to  advantage.  "You're 
the  dean,  I  suppose;  and  the  Committee  on 
Student  Affairs  and " 

Flossie  spluttered  her  wild  delight,  for  trou 
ble  was  her  natural  element. 

"Spiggy- Wiggy's  got  another  brain  storm !" 
she  giggled,  dancing  in  between  the  dangerous 


WHO  SAID  YOU  COULD  MAKE  A  SPEECH?  55 

pair.  "Gosh,  Spig,  if  you  only  knew  how  funny 
you  look " 

"I  should  like  to  know  by  whose  author 
ity "  he  was  taking  up  the  refrain  when 

she  cut  in:  'Til  tell  you,  Spig!  Why  don't 
you  go  and  look  it  up?" 

"What— look  up  what?" 

"The  authority.  Possibly  the  dean  would 
know ;  or  the  registrar." 

"I  see." 

"Now  run  along,  Spig.  That's  a  dear  kit 
ten." 

And  the  miracle  of  it  was  that  Spig  did  run 
along,  spitting  like  an  angry  leopard,  yet  un 
doubtedly  obeying.  She  was  a  hypnotist,  noth 
ing  less.  Chester  would  have  laughed,  but  the 
occasion  for  him  held  no  humor. 

"Don't  ask  me  to  have  another  glass  of  lem 
onade,"  she  went  right  on,  as  soon  as  they  were 
alone.  "It  hasn't  even  got  lemons  in  it.  Gee  I 
Isn't  it  lucky  you  don't  dance!  Because  it's 
awful  to  know  how  and  not  be  allowed.  It's 
just  the  way  drunkards  must  feel  when  they're 
locked  up  with  saloons  all  round  them.  There's 
one  next  to  my  aunt's  house  in  San  Francisco 
— a  drunkard,  I  mean." 


56  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Yes,  he  thought  he  was  Julius  Caesar  and 
crawled  out  on  the  roof." 

"So  he  did.    I  always  repeat  my  stories." 

So  she  rattled  along,  obviously  temporizing. 
She  had  a  way  of  snuggling,  and  to-night  she 
was  practicing  her  art  on  Chester  as  the  two 
leaned  against  a  window  sill.  His  heart  stood 
still,  waiting  for  something  it  was  breaking  to 
hear.  Not  a  word.  He  might  have  been  a 
casual  guest  instead  of  the  orator  of  the  even 
ing  for  all  the  importance  she  gave  to  his  so 
recent  triumph  or  to  the  large  gold  plaque  con 
spicuously  pinned  to  the  front  of  his  frock  coat. 

"What's  this  about  your  being  fired?"  he 
asked  after  one  of  his  looming  pauses. 

"Yeah,"  she  agreed;  "I  flunked  out  two 
weeks  ago." 

-'You  didn't  say  anything  about  it — to  me." 

"Didn't  I?  I  didn't  think  you'd  be  inter 
ested,  maybe." 

The  yellowish  gleam  of  her  half-closed  eyes 
got  him — a  fatal  wound.  It  was  then  that  he 
gave  up;  knew  why  he  had  treated  Carlotta 
so  shabbily  to-night;  realized  that  these  un 
worthy  weeks  he  hadn't  been  devoting  his 
evenings  to  Miss  Thompkins'  boarding  house 
merely  for  the  intellectual  upliftment  of  Miss 


WHO  SAID  YOU  COULD  MAKE  A  SPEECH?  57 

Florabel  Brannon.  Intellectually  she  was  ir 
reclaimable.  And  yet 

"Then  I  suppose  you're  going  home,"  he 
managed  to  say  after  clearing  his  throat. 

"This  morning  Old  Goggles" — by  this  she 
meant  the  registrar — "notified  me.  The  dar 
ling  was  sore  as  a  boil.  I'm  an  outlaw.  I 
don't  know  why  he  let  me  come  to  this  party' — = 
unless  he's  afraid  to  leave  me  unwatched." 

"When  do  you  go?"  repeated  the  unfortu 
nate. 

"On  the  eight-thirty-one  to-morrow.  And 
how  I  hate  to  get  up !"  She  yawned  in  antici 
pation. 

Not  a  word  for  him !  Her  eyes  were  roving 
toward  the  library  door,  through  which,  too 
apparently,  she  expected  The  Spiggoty  to  re 
turn,  cooled  and  repentant. 

Vanity  strangling  pride,  he  shuffled  his  pose 
and  asked  as  carelessly  as  he  knew  how:  "I 
don't  suppose  you  heard  the — er — speaking?" 

"Didn't  I,  though !    Wasn't  it  a  scream?" 

Of  course.  That  was  how  she  would  take 
it. 

"I  wasn't  aware " 

"That  was  what  made  it  so  funny,"  she  gig 
gled.  "You  weren't  aware — not  the  least  little 


158  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

bit.  What  was  the  name  of  the  gentleman  you 
stood  up  and  shouted  about  ?" 

-'William  of  Orange." 

"What  a  peculiar  name!  Now  if  I  was  go 
ing  to  be  a  historical  hero  I  wouldn't  name  my 
self  after  any  kind  of  fruit.  All  during  your 
sermon  I  was  thinking  how  awful  it  would  be 
to  have  people  call  you  Henry  of  Lemons  or 
Charlie  the  Apple  Man.  Now  you're  going  to 
get  mad  again." 

He  thrust  his  hands  deep  into  his  pockets 
and  took  a  shuffling  step  away.  It  was  fortu 
nate  for  Dyak  and  for  him  that  she  was  go 
ing  to-morrow  morning. 

"Chester!" 

She  called  it  after  him  in  the  sweetest  little 
voice.  It  was  the  first  time  she  had  ever  called 
him  anything  but  Cicero.  The  perfumed  an 
esthetic  unsteadied  him  and  when  he  turned  to 
ward  her  she  was  giving  him  the  full  benefit 
of  her  gaze;  her  lovely  cheeks  were  bright  as 
peonies. 

"You're  an  absurd  sort  of  kid,"  she  took  up 
her  theme  as  soon  as  he  had  got  back  to  the 
window  sill.  "With  your  hair  trimmed  and  a 
snappy  business  suit  on  I  think  you'd  really 
do." 


WHO  SAID  YOU  COULD  MAKE  A  SPEECH?  59 

"Do  for  what?"  he  growled,  trying  to  back 
away.  But  she  was  holding  him  fast  by  the 
broad  lapels  of  his  frock  coat. 

"Oh,  just  do.  You're  a  regular  handsome 
wretch,  Chester  A.  Framm.  But  you  do  need 
trimming." 

He  stood  there  like  a  mass  of  putty  between 
her  soft  white  hands:  a  passionate  mass  of 
putty  which  longed  to  clasp  her  and  make  ro 
mantic  avowals  that  would  have  been  wasted 
on  her  frivolous  ears.  One  of  those  mischiev 
ous  hands  had  now  strayed  up  to  the  William 
H.  Barbour  gold  medal  and  had  given  it  two 
swift  downward  jerks,  after  the  manner  of  a 
conductor  starting  a  street  car. 

"Jing-jing !"  she  chirped. 

?'Great  Scott!"  groaned  Chester,  covering 
the  trophy  from  her  further  profanation. 

"Oh  see  the  pretty  badge !  The  Grand  High 
Mookum  of  the  Refreshment  Committee  at  the 
Sons  and  Daughters  of  Ararat  Annual  Barbe 
cue.  Poor  old  Cicero !  Have  you  got  to  wear 
it  round  everywhere,  even  to  bed?" 

"Floss,  you're — awful,"  he  told  her  with  less 
severity  than  he  had  intended. 

"Did  it  take  you  all  this  time  to  find  it  out? 


60  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Well  now,  you'd  better  go  back  and  join  your 
tragedy  queen." 

This,  then,  was  to  be  good-by.  With  all  his 
suspected  genius  Chester  had  no  avowal  wor 
thy  of  the  occasion. 

'I'm — I'm  sorry  you  didn't  like  my  speech/' 
he  blurted. 

"Whew !"  she  whistled  and  burst  into  a  peal 
of  laughter.  "Who  in  the  world  ever  told  you 
you  could  make  a  speech?" 

"Good-by,"  said  he  shortly,  holding  out  his 
hand. 

"So  long,"  responded  Floss.  "See  you  in 
heaven,  maybe." 

He  now  took  his  departure  to  avoid  the  ap 
proaching  Spiggoty. 

"Chester."  Again  that  sweet  small  note 
rang  after  him.  He  came  rapidly  back. 

"Won't  you  give  me  that  badge  just  as — you 
know — one  of  those  souvenir  things  ?" 

How  wonderful  is  man !  Without  a  word  he 
loosened  the  golden  pin  from  his  coat  and  with 
trembling  fingers  fastened  the  William  H.  Bar- 
bour  medal  to  the  cluster  of  pink  chiffon  over 
the  place  where  her  heart  should  have  been. 
There  were  some  five  or  six  fraternity  pins  al 
ready  there. 


WHO  SAID  YOU  COULD  MAKE  A  SPEECH?  61' 

"Why  can't  I  see  you  to  the  train  in  the 
morning?"  he  pleaded  quite  deliriously. 

"Oh,  that  will  be  splen-did !"  she  cried.  Spig- 
goty  was  now  within  hearing  distance.  "Of 
course  there'll  be  quite  a  bus  load,  but  do 
come !" 

Next  morning  at  a  little  before  eight  he 
picked  up  the  bus  just  as  it  was  rounding  the 
museum  toward  Miss  Thompkins'  boarding 
house.  The  bus  contained  but  one  other  pas 
senger  so  far.  It  was  The  Spiggoty,  and  over 
his  hateful  knees  he  held  a  long  box,  obviously 
bearing  flowers.  They  were  as  nothing  to  one 
another,  though  the  drive  was  some  minutes 
long  and  they  were  permitted  to  sit  out  in  the 
cold  while  Flossie  kissed  Miss  Thompkins,  for 
got  her  hand  bag,  went  back  for  her  umbrella, 
remembered  she  had  packed  it,  and  kissed  Miss 
Thompkins  again  before  she  smilingly  an 
nounced  that  she  was  ready. 

On  the  way  to  the  station  Chester  sat  in  un 
comfortable  expectancy  that  the  Gammas  and 
the  Kappas  might  at  any  moment  storm  the 
wagon  in  competitive  good-bys.  But  their  ride 
was  unmarred  by  any  such  incident.  Appar 
ently  Floss  had  sifted  the  college  down  to  the 
present  pair.  She  took  De  Silva's  flowers  and 


62  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

called  him  a  sweetheart.  They  were  barely  in 
time  for  the  train,  and  the  picture  of  Miss 
Brannon  being  tossed  aboard  a  moving  coach, 
followed  by  hand  bags  and  flower  boxes,  was 
not  a  romantic  last  glimpse.  Just  a  flash  of 
pinkish  feather  and  eyes  that  were  intoxicating 
like  yellow  wine.  Her  voice  and  her  influence 
were  submerged  in  distance. 

Chester  A.  Framm  and  Ramon  de  Silva, 
equally  young,  equally  disillusioned,  stood  a 
moment  in  all  the  pathos  of  their  heroic  atti 
tudes.  Chester  had  an  impulse  to  speak  to  The 
Spiggoty  and  suggest  that  their  bygones 
should  be  wiped  out  in  what  was  too  plainly  a 
bygone.  Instead  the  unmedaled  orator  turned 
toward  the  east  gate  of  the  campus. 

Splashing  through  the  seasonable  mud  he 
could  descry  a  lone  bicycle,  female  in  sex,  wind 
ing  its  way  from  Faculty  Row  to  the  Quad. 
Carlotta  Beam,  even  though  engaged  in  the  un 
dignified  work  of  pedaling,  still  looked  the  god 
dess  that  she  was.  He  wasn't  sure  that  she 
hadn't  witnessed  that  good-by.  As  a  matter 
of  fact  he  didn't  care. 


CHAPTER  IV 

TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR 

sunshine  was  on  the  California  val 
leys  and  Chester  A.  Framm  was  already  strug 
gling  with  his  valedictorian  address  when  the 
Floss  Idea  interfered  to  wreck  his  program,  as 
it  always  did.  Having  wiped  her  off  the  slate 
he  had  found  life's  "problem  less  difficult,  if 
dreary  at  times.  He  had  reserved  Commence 
ment  Day  as  the  occasion  upon  which  he  should 
ask  Carlotta  Beam  to  marry  him.  It  was  a 
logical  step  upward  on  the  ladder  of  fame. 

He  had  taken  it  for  granted  that  she  would 
accept  him  and  he  was  justified  in  the  belief. 
Possibly  the  certainty  of  it  had  delayed  him  so 
long. 

On  the  very  eve  of  the  Floss  Idea  his  divine 
instructress  had  taken  him  in  hand  gently,  pa 
tiently,  as  was  her  wont. 

"We  mustn't  rest  on  our  laurels,"  she  had 
told  him  over  the  scribbled  notes  for  his  new 
oration.  "I  want  your  commencement  address 

63 


64  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

to  be  the  best  work  of  your  life  thus  far.  No 
steps  backward.  The  William  H.  Barbour 
medal" — she  never  asked  him  what  had  become 
of  it;  that  was  suspicious — "marked  the  first 
awakening.  Your  commencement  address 
must  be  your  challenge  to  life,  your  defiance  to 
petty  things,  mean  vanities  and — disturbing 
influences." 

Did  she  mean  Floss?  Surely  this  girl,  al 
ready  a  woman  in  mind  and  ability,  was  of  too 
noble  a  cast  to  harbor  spite  against  a  mere  red 
tam-o'-shanter.  Carlotta  Beam  was  the  finest 
woman  he  had  ever  met.  He  had  never  met 
many,  that  was  true.  But  she  had  within  her 
an  ideal  and  a  strength  that  seemed  to  warp 
other  women  to  the  realm  of  insects,  where  they 
belonged. 

On  the  night  before  the  Floss  Idea  he  walked 
home  under  the  springtime  stars,  picturing  to 
himself  numerous  public  occasions,  affairs 
of  nation-shaking  importance — Chester  A. 
Framm  always  the  central  figure  in  the  group ; 
his  wife,  always  an  invisible  influence  for  good, 
somewhere  in  the  background. 

Next  morning  a  boy  on  a  bicycle  brought  a 
telegram  over  from  the  station.  Fortunately 
for  Chester  his  mother  was  at  work  in  the  back 


TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR         65 

of  the  laundry,  so  he  got  the  messenger  paid 
off  and  the  envelope  open  undetected. 

"Meet  me  important  lunch  noon  College 
Inn.  FLOSS/' 

And  wasn't  it  ridiculous  and  unheard-of  and 
just  like  Floss?  Chester  had  never  known  of 
anything  quite  so  absurd.  He  hadn't  the  re 
motest  idea  of  meeting  her  "important  lunch 
noon  College  Inn."  That  was  settled.  In  the 
first  place  there  was  a  history  quiz  at  eleven- 
thirty.  In  the  second  place  he  hadn't  a  red 
cent  beyond  a  handful  of  laundry  money  which 
rightfully  belonged  to  his  mother.  In  the  third 
place  he  hadn't  any  clothes  beyond  the  dread 
ful  sack  suit  he  wore  and  his  ceremonial  cut 
away  ;  and  the  College  Inn  was  a  rather  horsy 
place,  specializing  in  red  steaks  and  brown  ale 
at  San  Francisco  prices — a  fashionable  rendez 
vous  for  the  gilded  youth  of  Dyak  who  could 
afford  fine  food  outside  the  college  dry  belt. 

Of  course  he  would  do  nothing  of  the  kind. 
Strengthened  by  this  resolve  he  stopped  at 
Baum's  Toggery  Shop  and  bought  himself  a 
dollar  necktie.  He  needed  it  undoubtedly,  to 
wear  to  his  history  quiz.  At  eleven  o'clock  he 
strolled  by  the  College  Inn  and  paused  before 


66  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

its  smart  Tudor  front  to  take  a  look  at  the 
place.  It  wasn't  far  out  of  his  way  to  the  class 
room;  just  a  mile  or  so.  He  put  on  something 
of  the  swagger  he  had  noted  among  the  lighter 
set  and  walked  into  the  big  dining  room,  which 
was  done  in  frowning  oak,  with  pewter  mugs 
along  the  shelves,  university  shields  painted  on 
the  frescoes,  and  in  a  far  corner  little  stalls 
holding  tables  for  two. 

After  all,  thought  Chester  A.  Framm,  she 
had  wired  him,  not  The  Spiggoty. 

Then  the  awful  thought  got  him  by  the 
throat:  How  did  he  know  she  hadn't  wired 
The  Spiggoty  ? 

He  got  out  before  a  waiter  could  head  him 
off  and  strolled  sheepishly  round  the  town, 
rumpling  in  his  pockets  the  few  hard-earned 
bills  wrested  from  the  laundry  business.  His 
mother  owed  him  that  much,  he  felt;  she  was 
making  money  and  he  was  doing  a  great  deal 
for  what  he  got.  He  looked  at  his  dollar  watch. 
It  was  lacking  six  minutes  of  twelve.  He 
turned  and  almost  ran  toward  the  College 
Inn.  A  bus  from  the  train  was  just  stopping 
at  the  door  when  he  swung  into  view.  A  girl 
in  a  green  coat — it  was  the  brightest  coat  he 
had  ever  seen — got  out  and  caused  the  driver 


TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR         67 

to  whoop  with  delight  as  she  handed  up  her 
fare.  Chester  was  still  of  a  mind  to  run  away, 
because  he  knew  that  Flossie  had  kept  her 
appointment. 

"Hello,  old  Goober!"  was  her  first  address 
to  him  as  she  took  both  his  hot  hands  in  her 
little  gloves.  "How's  fame?" 

"I — I  don't  know,"  he  faltered,  studying  the 
face  which  seemed  to  trick  him  out  of  every 
thing  he  revered  in  life.  "I  haven't  been  watch 
ing  very  closely." 

"My  word !"  she  exclaimd.  "I  thought  that 
Hissing  Hattie's  angel  daughter  would  have 
you  in  Congress  by  now." 

She  had  tiptoed  up  the  steps  and  was  leading 
the  way  into  the  dining  room.  Once  inside  she 
made  a  bee  line  for  one  of  the  small  stalls  at 
the  end  of  the  room. 

"Order  me  pounds  and  pounds  of  raw  meat," 
she  commanded  as  soon  as  they  were  seated; 
and  when  a  chubby  waiter  had  made  his  ap 
pearance,  "Hello,  Harry!" 

"Good  morning,  Miss  Brannon."  He  was 
smiles  all  over,  as  Flossie's  environment  was 
apt  to  be.  "I  thought  you  quit." 

"I  did.  And  Harry,  bring  in  one  of  those 
deep-dish  things  full  of  grass  and  tomatoes — 


68  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

and  if  you  love  me  don't  pour  any  of  that  lin 
seed  stuff  over  it." 

"I  won't,  Miss  Brannon,"  avowed  the  hum 
blest  of  her  adorers. 

"And  oo — have  you  got  some  of  that  sweet 
heart  old  dove  of  a  clam  chowder  you  used  to 
have?" 

"The  very  same ;  quite  good,  Miss  Brannon." 

"Forward  march !"  commanded  the  disturb 
ing  influence. 

"Fm  so  hungry,"  she  told  Chester  as  soon 
as  they  were  alone,  "that  I  could  eat  sauer 
kraut." 

"So  am  I,"  he  confessed.  It  was  strange, 
but  this  was  the  first  occasion  for  months  when 
he  had  looked  forward  to  his  food. 

"And  you're  going  to  ask,  'To  what  do  I  owe 
the  pleasure  of  this  visit  to?'  I  know  you  are. 
Dear  old  Cicero — will  you  be  just  too  dread 
fully  shocked  for  words  if  I  tell  you  that  I've 
missed  you?" 

"Not  half  so  much  as  I've  missed  you,"  he 
heard  his  trancelike  tones  repeating. 

"Not  really !"  And  to  his  ineffable  surprise 
her  eyes  grew  bright  with  tears. 

"Has  anything  happened,  Flossie  ?  Anything 
in  the  world  that  I  can  do  for  you  ?" 


TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR         69 

"Happened !"  As  suddenly  she  was  laughing 
again.  "Cicero,  what  couldn't  happen  to  me?" 

"You've  stated  the  case,"  he  agreed,  and 
smiled  one  of  his  solemn  smiles. 

"Well,  you  see  Aunt  Het — she's  awfully 
funny  when  she  gets  mad.  She  has  false  teeth 
and Hello,  here's  the  sweetheart  old  chow 
der!" 

The  connection  between  teeth  and  temper 
was  left  unexplained  while  Flossie  Brannon 
went  at  her  food  with  a  vigor  most  unmaidenly. 

"We're  awfully  early  and  jay,"  she  volun 
teered  after  her  plate  had  been  half  cleared. 
"But  this  is  a  business  man's  lunch.  The  train 
goes  back  at  three-twelve." 

"Goes  back  wrhere?" 

"To  San  Francisco,  Mr.  Geese." 

"Oh." 

She  reverted  to  her  chowder.  Three  early 
Kappas  filed  in,  gave  a  dramatic  start  and 
settled  down  at  a  table  in  an  opposite  corner. 
Flossie  Brannon  never  looked  their  way.  Ches 
ter  was  ineffably  grateful,  partly  because  an 
interruption  would  have  maddened  him,  partly 
because  Kappas  and  Gammas  with  their  world 
ly  airs  made  him  more  awkward  than  Nature 
had  intended  him  to  be. 


70  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"So  your  Aunt  Het,"  he  prompted  her  as 
soon  as  steak  impended. 

"She  always  loses  her  false  teeth  when  she 
gets  mad.  Think  of  anybody  not  being  glad  to 
see  me!  She  stuck  me  in  a  dungeon  dire  and 
said  that  I  was  worse  than  my  grandfather. 
Of  course  that's  a  slander.  Then  she  trotted 
out  Mr.  Blink;  he's  just  desperate  to  marry  me 
and  I  had  a  lot  of  fun  spoiling  his  life  for  a 
few  weeks " 

"Who's  this  Mr.  Blink?"  he  huskily  inquired. 

"That  isn't  the  name  on  his  office  door.  He's 
worth  three  hundred  and  six  squillion  dollars 
and  he's  so  near  blind  that  he  couldn't  see  me 
half  the  time  when  I  was  making  faces  at  him. 
Then  it  got  so  tragic  and  disgusting — the  way 
I  behaved  and  all — that  Aunt  Het  delivered  a 
manifesto." 

Flossie  paused  and  adored  the  steak. 

"Are  those  silly  little  Kappas  still  gheeking 
at  us?"  she  asked  after  her  first  bite.  That 
also  was  like  Floss. 

"They're  still  there,"  he  acknowledged  nerv 
ously. 

"Let  'em  stay." 

"So  your  Aunt  Het  delivered  a  manifesto." 


TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR         71 

"Mr.  Blink  and  Aunt  Het  got  together  and 
announced  our  engagement." 

"To  Mr.  Blink— publicly!''  he  gasped  like  a 
fish. 

"No ;  just  to  me.  That  was  yesterday.  Poor 
old  Aunt  Het — she's  suffered  so  after  I  got 
home.  So  last  night  she  sat  up  till  all  hours 
telling  me  I  was  a  drug  on  the  market  and  that 
if  I  didn't  marry  Mr.  Blink — and  that  right 
sudden — she'd  tie  a  can  to  me  and  start  me 
toward  the  Cliff  House.  So  I  went  to  my  room 
and  had  a  good  cry " 

"Poor  Flossie!"  said  the  distracted  Chester 
Framm,  longing  to  pick  her  up  and  administer 
comfort  in  the  very  presence  of  the  Kappas. 

"Oh,  I  enjoyed  it  ever  so  much.  And  this 
morning,  I  just  packed  my  bags  and  came  to 
you." 

It  was  all  so  fearfully  simple — like  an  earth 
quake  or  a  forest  fire. 

"Flossie,  my  dear,"  he  asked  her  upon  that 
wonder,  "why  in  the  world  did  you  come  to 
me?" 

"Why!"  She  opened  her  wide  eyes  upon 
him.  "You're  in  love  with  me,  aren't  you?" 

It  came  quite  naturally,  as  miracles  are  apt 
to  come. 


72 THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"I'd  die  for  you/'  he  whispered,  and  leaned 
over  to  look  down  into  those  wells  of  gold. 

"Bully !"  she  cried.    "Then  it's  all  fixed !" 

"What's  all  fixed?" 

He  came  swooning  back  to  the  great  world. 

"Why,  I'm  in  love  with  you  too/'  she  in 
formed  him  with  her  terrible  directness,  and 
passed  him  her  hand  in  bold  defiance  of  the 
Kappa  stare. 

"When — when  did  this  happen?"  He 
clutched  her  fingers  incredulously. 

"I  got  to  thinking  about  you.  I'm  a  terrible 
deep  thinker  when  I  get  started.  You're  all 
over  great  big  knobs  of  crudeness — but  I  don't 
know.  Falling  in  love's  like  dropping  into  a 
canal — you  can't  tell  just  what  drop  drowned 
you,  can  you?  You're  an  awful  slob  and  you 
do  need  a  haircut — and  what  couldn't  I  do  with 
you  in  a  new  suit  of  clothes !  These  other  little 
feathers" — a  gesture  indicated  the  Kappas  and 
the  Gammas  and  all  the  Greek  alphabet — 
"they'll  be  either  dead  drunk  or  clerking  in  shoe 
stores  in  a  few  years.  You've  got — what-you- 
call-'em — poss-i-bil-i-ties.  Gee,  what  a  long 
word." 

His  heart  stood  still.  Then  she  had,  after 
all,  appreciated  his  oratorical  gifts. 


TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR         73 

"You  mean  my " 

"You've  got  a  won-derful  head  for  busines3. 
Just  see  the  way  you  built  up  that  laundry/' 

He  would  have  dropped  her  hand  had  it  not 
been  so  delicious. 

"Floss,  I  haven't  had  a  happy  minute  since 
you  left  It  seemed  to  take  away  all  my " 

"That  darned  ambition !  I  know.  Now  listen 
to  me,  Cicero.  Please  propose,  and  do  it  now. 
You  don't  need  to  kiss  me — yet" 

"Will  you  marry  me?" 

"This  afternoon,  Goober." 

"Goober?" 

"That's  what  I'm  going  to  call  you  when 
we're  married." 

"But  this  afternoon "  he  faltered  on  the 

brink  of  paradise.  "I've  got  to  graduate,  you 
know." 

"What  for?" 

"I  can't  get  a  diploma  unless  I  do." 

"What  in  all  the  little  green  planets  do  you 
need  a  diploma  for  ?  To  hang  up  in  your  office 
and  show  to  out-of-town  customers?  You've 
got  all  there  is  out  of  college  by  now.  But,  of 
course,  if  you  must  wait  I'll  have  to  go  back 
to  San  Francisco  and  fish  out  Mr.  Blink." 

"No  you  won't!"  he  declared  savagely. 


74.  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Old  Mr.  Brutal !"  she  smiled  adorably. 

"But  I  haven't  got  a  cent  of  money.  Ma 
hates  the  sight  of  you  and  we  can't  live  at  the 
laundry." 

"I've  looked  out  for  ev-erything,"  she  said. 
"I've  brought  a  hundred  and  twenty-eight  dol 
lars  in  my  own  little  selfish  purse." 

"Check,  please/'  said  Chester  A.  Framm 
hoarsely  to  the  waiter. 

"We'd  better  hurry,"  Flossie  reminded  him. 
"The  three-twelve  is  the  only  train  out  of  here 
this  afternoon." 

How  Chester  A.  Framm  took  his  hand  bag 
away  from  the  Bon  Ton  Laundry  is  of  histori 
cal  importance,  since  it  records  one  of  those 
sorrows  which  seem  to  await  upon  a  great  joy. 

"I've  got  to  run  to  town  for  a  couple  of 
days,"  he  told  his  mother  sheepishly  as  he 
encountered  her  at  the  desk  making  out  bills. 

"Now,  Ches  ?  Right  in  the  midst  of  all  your 
work?" 

"It's  important." 

He  only  knew  that  the  three-twelve  wouldn't 
wait  and  Floss  was  loving  on  schedule. 

"Chester !"  The  great  broad  woman  slid  her 
spectacles  over  her  gray  hair  and  gave  him 
such  a  look  as  he  had  never  seen  from  her. 


TWO  STRAWS  AND  A  ZEPHYR        75 

"Has  it  got  anything  to  do  with  that  yellow- 
haired  chit?" 

"Miss  Brannon,  you  mean?" 

"If  that's  her  silly  name.  I  don't  want  you 
to  go  trifling  with  her  any  more.  She  stole 
your  medal  away  from  you  and  she'll  steal  your 
character.  She's  not  for  any  young  man's  good. 
She  paints  her  face  and  smokes  cigareets 
and " 

He  could  hear  the  train  tooting  in  the  dis 
tance. 

"Good-bye,  mother,"  he  roared,  and  went 
charging  away  toward  his  peculiar  destiny. 

As  the  train  pulled  out  a  lonesome  figure 
could  be  seen  at  the  end  of  the  Dyak  platform. 
Somber  eyes  fringed  with  lampblack  were 
anxiously  scanning  each  passing  window. 

"Poor  Spig!"  sighed  Chester's  sudden  bride- 
to-be,  waving  her  hand  toward  one  who, 
vanishing  in  distance,  had  recognized  her  a 
moment  too  late. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS 

"Kiss  me  quick  and  say  you  love  me  twice, 
rapidly,"  commanded  Chester  A.  Framm's 
bride  of  three  days;  and  when  that  was  dis 
patched  as  per  orders:  "She  is  a  terror,  no 
mistake !  And  if  I  scream  or  she  screams  don't 
waste  a  minute — come  a-running  and  pull  me 
out.  Good-by." 

Thus  she  left  him  amid  the  somber  glories 
of  Aunt  Het's  parlor;  he  had  a  last  fond 
glimpse  of  that  small  bright  figure  rounding  the 
walnut  newel  post  which  pedestaled  a  brass 
knight  with  a  gas  lamp  on  the  end  of  his  spear. 
They  had  honeymooned  three  days  in  a  remote 
San  Francisco  hotel,  and  this  morning,  their 
money  nearing  ebb  tide,  she  had  inducted  Ches 
ter  to  an  example  of  those  old-fashioned  grip 
cars  which  used  to  run  funicular- fashion  up 
one  of  the  steepest  streets  of  the  steepest  city 
in  America.  The  fog,  which  had  grayed  all  the 
depressing  high-stooped  residences  along  their 

76 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       77 

ascent,  had  got  into  Chester's  soul ;  all  the  way 
up  Floss  had  cheered  him  with  piratical  anec 
dotes  descriptive  of  Aunt  Het's  whimsies, 
which  ended  in  revolting  scenes,  always  sig 
naled  by  a  slight  loosening  of  her  false  teeth. 

An  unpleasant  Chinese  butler  had  admitted 
them  to  an  ornamented  slate-colored  residence 
near  the  top  of  the  hill.  Being  deserted  with 
orders  to  come  a-running  upon  call  Chester 
paced  restlessly  the  full  length  of  a  vasty  parlor 
which  was  a  room-and-a-half  tall,  full  of  mor 
tuary  ornaments  and  tyrannized  over  by  a 
lofty  black  mantel  whose  innumerable  pillars, 
shelves,  pagodas  and  bastions  were  thickly  pop 
ulated  with  gnomelike  shapes  of  bric-a-brac. 
From  a  far-away  end  of  the  room  a  California 
pioneer,  done  in  snowy  marble,  stared  un 
friendly  from  his  pink  plush  pedestal. 

Silence,  slience  everywhere.  It  was  the  tall 
est  room  Chester  had  ever  seen,  and  aside  from 
its  depressing  influences  the  bridegroom  was  a 
prey  to  troubled  thoughts.  What  of  his  angry 
mother,  and  what  of  the  high-souled  Carlotta, 
equally  deserted  in  this  frenzy  of  young  love? 
He  had  fed  on  honey  dew  and  drunk  the  milk 
of  paradise;  a  changed  man  he  must  be  for- 
evermore.  But  could  he  change?  Would 


78  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Florabel,  who  obviously  loved  him  well,  de 
mand  that  he  should  forget  his  ideals,  desert 
his  destiny? 

He  paused  in  his  pacing  to  look  at  himself 
in  one  of  Aunt  Het's  sky-aspiring  mirrors.  His 
hair  trimmed,  his  scarf  Floss-tied  in  the  mode 
of  the  day,  his  imposing  figure  draped  in  a 
rather  well-fitting  suit  of  gray — he  was  already 
quite  a  different  person  from  the  young  orator 
of  Dyak.  His  appearance  was,  as  Floss  had 
termed  it,  "snappy";  and  he  wondered  if  he 
could  stand  himself  that  way.  A  life  of  seri 
ous  application  and  of  self-support  had  aged 
him  beyond  his  years ;  you  would  have  placed 
him  at  round  thirty  had  you  been  there  to 
appraise  his  business  possibilities. 

It  seemed  a  fearful  wait,  down  there  in  the 
mortuary  parlor.  What  had  the  heartless  Het 
chosen  to  do  to  his  Flossie,  whose  poor  weak 
hands  were  pitted  unarmed  against  the  dragon? 
Chester  was  nervous,  as  well  he  might  be.  The 
silence  was  unbearable. 

"Hor-rors!  Ho-lee  hor-raws!  Aw!  Stop 
it!  Aw-aw!" 

It  came  in  a  frenzied  scream  from  the  up 
stairs  apartments  and  caused  an  icy  rill  down 
the  back  of  the  anxious  waiter  upon  trouble. 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       79 

His  feet  and  his  heart  stood  still  at  the  same 
time.  When  warm  blood  would  course  again 
he  tiptoed  as  far  as  the  brass  knight  on  the 
newel  post  and  peered  superstitiously  up  the 
stairs.  An  enormous  red-and-green  macaw  sat 
on  its  perch  at  the  first  landing,  its  head  upside 
down,  one  red  eye  fixed  in  critical  scrutiny. 

"Lord  bless  your  life!    Haw,  haw!" 

Chester  breathed  again.  After  all  it  was 
only  the  parrot ;  never  a  shriek,  never  a  scream 
had  sounded  from  his  adored  Floss  or  from  the 
fire-devouring  Het.  But  the  incident  had  the 
effect  of  unnerving  him  completely.  What 
sort  of  witch  could  it  be  that  would  keep  this 
bird  of  evil  a  sentinel  on  the  stairs  ?  And  what 
had  he  and  Floss  to  hope  from  the  offended 
monster  lurking  somewhere  in  her  upper  den? 

"Oh,  Goober!  Goob!" 

He  was  immensely  relieved  to  hear  Flossie's 
thrilling  voice,  clear  and  undiscouraged. 

"Yes,  darling !"  he  shouted  up  the  stairs. 

"You  can  come  up  now." 

He  took  it  at  three  leaps,  evaded  a  savage 
peck  from  the  parrot,  and  crushed  his  endan 
gered  bride  in  his  arms. 

"Don't,"  she  whispered  in  an  annoyed  tone, 
and  by  the  look  of  her  face  it  was  plain  to  be 


80  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

seen  that  the  ordeal  had  been  a  hard  one.  "Just 
be  natural  and — come  on!" 

She  led  him  into  the  chamber  of  torment. 
Blinking  in  the  light  of  the  big  old-fashioned 
boudoir  he  was  preparing  to  be  natural  when 
his  calculations  were  quite  shattered  by  the 
miracle  which  pounced  out  upon  him.  Some 
thing  in  a  lacy  coquettish  garment  had  rushed 
from  behind  a  screen  and  before  he  could  take 
measures  to  defend  himself  someone  had  kissed 
him  heartily  on  both  cheeks.  He  beheld  an 
elderly  lady,  about  Floss-size,  enameled  and 
elaborately  jeweled,  grasping  him  by  the  elbows 
while  her  high  cracked  voice  repeated. 

"So  this  is  the  husband?  I'm  so  relieve'd. 
You're  not  half  so  ugly  as  I  thought  you  would 
be." 

"Now,  Aunt  Het — you  know  I  said  he  was 
the  most  bee-ootiful  little  old  gigantic  slob " 

Flossie's  protest  thoroughly  established  the 
marvel.  So  it  was  Aunt  Het !  But  what  had 
Floss  been  doing  to  her? 

"As  if  I  didn't  have  worries  enough  on  my 
mind,"  she  went  right  on  with  some  monologue 
which  apparently  he  had  interrupted,  "without 
you  two  things  running  off  to  a  third 
rate  preacher  and  getting  married !  If  you  had 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       81 

come  to  me  in  the  first  place  I'd  have  had  the 
First  Spiritualist  Church  with  the  Reverend 
Mr.  Billings " 

"Aunt  Het  believes  in  'em,"  explained  Floss, 
indicating  the  Great  Beyond. 

"She  believes  in  nothing/'  pronounced  the 
old  lady,  folding  her  frivolous  hands. 

Chester  thought  it  time  to  change  the  subject. 

'We're — we're  very  grateful  that  you're  not 
angry " 

"Angry?" 

He  looked  in  alarm  to  see  if  her  false  teeth 
were  dropping.  They  were  firmly  established 
and  revealed  by  innumerable  smiles.  His  wife's 
great-aunt  had  the  Flossie  look,  faded  but 
still  girlish. 

'What  should  I  be  angry  about?" 

'Well,  when  you  saw  Miss  Brannon — Mrs. 
Framm — coming  back  married,  you  know " 

"I  was  never  so  relieved  in  my  life." 

"Oh." 

"I  could  have  danced  with  joy.  Just  to  think 
— she's  finally  off  my  hands !" 

This  last  was  inspiring. 

"If  you'd  only  know  what  misery  that  girl 
has  cost  me !" 

She  sighed. 


82  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"But  auntie,  love/'  upspoke  that  girl,  whose 
study  of  psychology  had  taught  her  at  least  to 
know  the  psychological  moment,  "the  trouble's 
just  begun/' 

"I  thought  so.  Oliver  came  to  me  last  night 
and  told  me  to  prepare."  Oliver,  it  turned  out, 
was  her  spirit  guide. 

Aunt  Het  sat  down  and  Chester  had  a 
fearful  feeling  that  the  teeth  had  dropped  the 
fraction  of  an  inch. 

"We  haven't  got  the  price  of  a  hot  tamale 
between  us,  Aunt  Het,"  explained  Chester's 
wife.  "If  we  could  live  on  love  we'd  just  swell 
up  and  bust.  But  we  can't." 

"So  you've  come  home  to  live  on  me?"  The 
withered  lady  set  her  little  mouth  so  that  the 
index  of  her  temper  was  invisible;  yet  there 
were  signs  of  storm. 

"Just  temporarily,  Aunt  Het.  You  see  my 
Goober's  aw-fully  talented.  Aren't  you,  Cic 
ero?  And  if  you  could  just  lend  us  a  trunk 
room  to  sleep  in  and  feed  us  any  old  scraps 
that  Oscar  doesn't  want " 

Oscar  being  the  parrot,  that  appeal  was 
humble  enough.  "I  don't  intend  to  let  you 
starve!"  snapped  the  old  lady,  her  frivolity 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS      83 

departed.  "But  what  are  the  special  talents  of 
your — your  Goober,  as  you  call  him?" 

"He  would  do  splendidly  in  the  insurance 
business,"  was  Flossie's  quick  diagnosis.  Which 
was  startling  news  to  Chester  A.  Framm. 

"But  you  don't  know  anybody  in  the  insur 
ance  business — except  Mr.  Applethwaite." 

"Old  Mr.  Blink?  Yeppy.  He's  vice  presi 
dent  of  the  Invisible  Life  and  he  can't  refuse 
to  give  Chester  a  tiny  little  job." 

"What  ?"  There  came  an  unmistakable  rat 
tling  of  ivory  with  the  explosion.  "Do  you 
mean  to  say  you  would  have  the  very  poor 
taste  to  ask  a  favor  of  him — after  the  way 
you've  treated  and  tormented  and  jilted  him?" 

"Course  I  would,  old  auntix!  He  told  me 
eleven  times  in  one  evening  that  he  loved  me 
more  than  wealth  or  fame.  I  guess  after  that 
the  least  he  could  do  would  be  to  give  my  sweet 
heart  a  job." 

"Well,  of  all  the "  began  Aunt  Het,  but 

failing  in  eloquence  continued:  "I  should  say 
that  Mr.  Applethwaite  was  about  the  most  un 
likely  candidate  in  the  field." 

"Sure.  And  that's  why  I'm  going  to  tackle 
him." 

"Flossie,"    exclaimed   her   great-aunt,    ac- 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


knowledging  defeat  in  the  last  of  a  thousand 
things,  "I  sometimes  think  you're  playing  a 
system." 

This  was  the  manner  of  Chester  A.  Framm's 
introduction  to  life's  real  problems.  He  had 
always  despised  the  wastrels  who  marry  for 
wealth,  but  it  would  have  taken  a  stretch  of  the 
imagination  to  have  accused  him  of  that.  The 
cumbersome  suite  which  Aunt  Het  gave  them 
on  the  third  floor  was  many  degrees  more  ex 
alted  than  a  trunk  room,  and  the  food  was 
surely  not  discarded  by  Oscar.  Though  their 
bedroom  and  parlor  were  cluttered  with  an 
overflow  of  curios  from  below,  their  quarters 
were  comfortable  beyond  their  foolish  deserts. 
During  the  first  uncertain  weeks  of  married 
life  Floss  did  many  odd  jobs  in  this  small  estab 
lishment,  even  washing  clothes  in  the  old- 
fashioned  bathtub  and  on  a  wabbly  gas  jet 
heating  over  their  breakfast,  which  came  up 
on  a  tray.  Aunt  Het,  who  had  buried  three 
husbands,  preferred  to  spend  her  mornings 
with  Oscar  the  parrot  and  a  mixed  company 
of  loved  ones  from  the  Beyond.  It  was  a  com 
fortable,  patronizing  arrangement  which  at 
first  chafed  the  pride  of  Framm.  That  pride 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       85 

grew  callous  beyond  ordinary  chafings,  as  we 
are  yet  to  see. 

They  had  scarcely  carried  their  limited  bag 
gage  to  the  temporary  quarters  and  hung  their 
clothes  in  two  of  the  looming  spirit  cabinets 
when  Floss  set  herself  to  a  talent  which  had 
been  revealed  during  the  honeymoon.  She  took 
off  her  hat  and  trimmed  it.  Back  in  Dyak  days 
Chester  had  often  wondered  at  her  profusion 
of  millinery;  matrimonial  experience  taught 
him  that  she  could  entirely  alter  the  appear 
ance  of  her  headdress  in  less  time  than  it  takes 
most  women  to  comb  their  hair. 

On  this  pioneer  day  Floss  "went  upstairs 
wearing  a  blue  feather.  Five  minutes  later  she 
was  standing  in  front  of  a  ramshackle  mirror 
trying  on  a  lacy  turban  with  silver  braid  wound 
round  and  round.  This  was  Chester's  purely 
untechincal  impression  as  he  sat  on  the  edge 
of  the  bed  and  reflected  that  his  wife's  appear 
ance  was  modish  in  the  extreme.  Tight  waists 
were  being  worn  in  that  period  of  the  world's 
history,  and  Floss  could  make  herself  very  slim 
at  midlady  without  extravagant  lacings. 

"Are  you  going  to  see  this — this  Blink  now  ?" 
inquired  her  husband,  nervously  admiring  the 
flash  of  her  wonderful  complexion  in  the  mir- 


86 THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

ror  as  she  stood  there  patting  her  honey-colored 
hair  and  perking  from  side  to  side. 

"You'll  notice  I'm  wearing  a  plain  blue  walk 
ing  suit,"  she  soliloquized,  "gently  outlining  the 
figure  and  showing  a  touch  of  scarlet  at  the 
throat.  He  was  always  crazy  about  me  in 
blue — poor  thing!  What  were  you  saying, 
Goober?" 

"Are  you  going  to  see  this  Mr.  Blink  right 
away?" 

"Yeah."  She  spoke  it  casually,  her  mouth 
being  full  of  pins.  It  was  as  though  he  had 
asked  her  if  she  was  going  to  walk  or  take  a 
street  car. 

"But,  precious — I'm  not  sure  I  shall  care 
about  the  insurance  business." 

He  had  to  wait  for  his  reply  until  she  had 
used  all  the  pins  on  her  lace  collar. 

"I'm  not  frenzied  about  it  either.  But  what 
are  we  going  to  do?  We  can't  start  right  in 
making  orations.  I  don't  know  of  anybody 
getting  rich  out  of  that — except  the  man  who 
sells  soap  on  the  street  in  front  of  the  City 
Library."  Suddenly  she  dropped  a  bar  pin, 
the  convertible  hat  and  a  scrap  of  silk  as,  turn 
ing  round,  she  faced  her  Chester  with  an  ex 
pression  of  divine  guidance. 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       87 

"Cicero !"  she  crowed.  "Speaking  of  the  City 
Library  and  the  soap — I've  got  an  idea !" 
"We  need  one,"  said  he.    "What  is  it?" 
"Nope,  I  shan't  tell  you  until  you're  polite/' 
"I'm  polite,"  he  protested,  trying  to  kiss  her. 
"What's  the  idea?" 

"Nope.    It's  got  to  cook  until  it's  tender." 
When  she  had  resumed  her  hat  he  took  her 
as  far  as  the  corner,  but  there  she  pointed  him 
west  as  she  turned  east. 

"Aunt  Het  won't  give  us  any  lunch,"  she 
decreed.  "But  if  you'll  meet  me  at  the  Poodle 
Dog — half  past  twelve — I'll  tell  you  about  Mr. 
Blink  and  what  he  says." 

"The  Poodle  Dog?  Do  you  think  we  ought 
to  eat  at  those  expensive  places  when  we're 
nearly  broke?" 

"Course  we  ought!"  She  opened  wide  her 
golden  eyes  at  the  very  idea.  "Why,  Goob — 
all  the  scientists  say  that  if  paupers  were  bet 
ter  nourished  there  wouldn't  be  any  poverty  or 
crimes.  Now  run  along  and  think  hard." 

Any  town  looks  cold  to  the  unemployed.  San 
Francisco,  which  has  harbored  many  galleons 
out  of  strange  seas,  was  once  accused  by  a 
poet  of  being  serene,  indifferent  to  fate.  I  have 


88  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

never  found  it  to  be  either,  but  the  forenoons 
there  are  clammy,  especially  on  the  shady  side 
of  the  street.  At  least  this  was  the  case  in 
my  day,  which  was  Chester's  day ;  indeed  I  have 
no  reason  to  think  that  the  famous  fire  and — 
I  almost  said  earthquake — ever  altered  that 
aspect  of  Nature. 

Coming  out  of  a  warm  California  valley  into 
this  inspiring  fog  belt  Chester  was  obliged  to 
turn  up  his  coat  collar  as  he  walked.  Trudging 
along,  shivering,  blue,  he  was  the  picture  of 
one  who  had  lost  his  soul's  wish  to  gain  his 
heart's  desire.  He  was  in  a  strange  flux  of 
happiness  and  misery.  Could  he  ever  make 
peace  with  his  offended  mother?  Apparently 
not.  The  Widow  Framm,  he  knew  by  experi 
ence,  loved  and  hated  like  an  Indian.  Lost  in 
the  roses  of  his  misfit  romance  he  felt  the 
scratch  of  the  thorns  at  every  step.  If  there 
be  a  difference  between  love  and  infatuation  he 
was  infatuated  more  than  he  was  in  love.  At 
any  rate,  that  peculiar  composition  of  fluff  and 
mockery  whom  he  called  his  wife  now  filled 
every  crevice  of  his  heart.  He  would  do  any 
thing  for  Floss. 

Anything,  did  he  say? 

He  stopped  on  the  edge  of  a  down-shooting 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       89 

street  comer  and  considered  his  case.  For  him, 
so  it  seemed,  she  had  given  up  one  of  the  rich 
est  men  in  San  Francisco.  And  for  her  he 
had  sworn  to  trample  out,  destroy  forever  that 
one  talent  which  is  death  to  hide.  Less  than 
an  hour  before  the  hasty  marriage  ceremony 
she  had  burst  into  a  flood  of  hysterical  tears 
and  declared  that  she  wouldn't  marry  him  un 
less  he  swore  never,  never,  never  to  make  a 
public  speech  without  her  knowledge  and  con 
sent.  The  impassioned  Chester  had  sworn. 
Was  it  an  ingrowing  jealousy  of  Carlotta  Beam 
that  possessed  her  or  was  she  obtuse  to  his 
true  merit  ?  Both,  probably.  At  any  rate,  since 
love  was  not  all  in  his  book  of  life  he  was  re 
solved  to  wear  down  her  prejudice  as  soon  as 
they  were  on  their  feet  financially,  and  take  up 
the  study  of  the  law  after  work  hours.  For 
Chester  A.  Framm  had  no  intention  of  sacrific 
ing  his  genius  at  the  altar  of  Aphrodite. 

At  length  his  wanderings  got  him  down  to 
Market  Street  within  sight  of  the  dingy,  pon 
derous  dome  of  the  old  City  Hall.  The  official 
sight  reminded  him  bitterly  of  his  greatness, 
now  in  a  state  of  suspended  animation.  He 
walked  along  the  vistas  of  Pompeian  grandeur, 
marking  the  stream  of  hard-faced  lawyers 


90 THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

passing  in  and  of  soft- faced  politicians  passing 
out.  Some  came  in  rich  carriages,  others  afoot 
— mostly  afoot.  The  men  whose  countenances 
he  so  wistfully  examined  scarcely  pleased  him 
as  types ;  very  little  statesmanship  here,  he  con 
cluded,  and  was  about  to  pass  on  when  a  black- 
sanded  sign  with  gold  letters  caught  his  eye — 
Public  Library. 

So  this  was  the  place  where,  according  to 
Floss's  naive  suggestion,  he  might  employ  his 
oratory  in  the  humble  trade  of  selling  soap.  He 
glanced  morbidly  over  the  cobbled  streets,  but 
nothing  of  the  soapy  spellbinder  was  to  be  seen. 
Chester  paused  and  regarded  the  black-sanded 
sign.  Public  Library.  After  all,  he  had  nearly 
two  hours  on  his  hands.  Surely  Floss  could  not 
object  to  his  employing  his  odd  time  in  his 
favorite  study. 

He  obeyed  the  impulse,  went  in,  picked  out  a 
broad  volume  entitled  Speakers  Past  and  Pres 
ent,  and  with  this  stole  guiltily  into  the  reading 
room.  There  was  an  available  oak  table  near 
the  window,  with  one  industrious  female 
crouching  over  her  book ;  and  in  this  compara 
tive  solitude  Chester  opened  Speakers  Past  and 
Present  at  the  logical  place,  the  Preface.  It 
turned  out  to  be  a  set  of  biographical  sketches, 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS       91 

limited  to  Speakers  of  the  Assembly  at  Sacra 
mento.  Chester  sighed.  Fate  was  against 
him.  Therefore  he  closed  the  volume  in  some 
disgust  and  had  barely  looked  up  when  the 
studious  female  at  the  other  end  of  the  table 
looked  up  also.  Their  dream-filled  eyes  met. 

Horn  of  judgment!    It  was  Carlotta  Beam! 

Chester,  who  was  no  coward,  would  have  run 
away,  carrying  the  book,  the  table,  the  library 
wall  with  him  in  headlong  flight.  But  man, 
having  outgrown  the  honest  direct  methods  of 
the  rhinoceros,  has  schooled  himself  to  sit  pat 
in  the  face  of  an  embarrassing  situation.  Ches 
ter's  eyes  were  on  Carlotta,  Carlotta's  on  Ches 
ter.  The  more  he  looked  the  more  confused  it 
all  became,  because  Miss  Beam,  if  she  had  been 
hurt  by  his  elopement  from  Dyak,  was  indeed 
concealing  it  bravely.  He  had  never  before 
seen  her  naturally  serious  face  wear  so  bright  a 
smile  as  she  showed  him  when,  closing  her 
book,  she  came  over  to  his  chair. 

"Chester !"  she  cried.  "Isn't  this  miraculous] 
I  hadn't  the  least  idea——" 

"Sh-h-h!" 

An  old  gentleman  at  the  next  table  uttered 
this  rattlesnake's  warning  as  he  pointed  to  a 
large  sign — No  Conversation. 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


Whereat  Chester  rose  limply  and  whispered 
"Outside." 

As  they  went  to  the  entrance  and  stood  lean 
ing  against  the  coping  Chester  was  sure  she 
was  looking  unusually  well;  there  was  a  little 
color  in  her  sallow  cheeks  and  her  dark  eyes 
lingered  fondly  upon  him.  "If  you  only  real 
ized  it,"  she  smiled  happily,  "it  was  you  who 
brought  me  up  to  San  Francisco." 

"Me  !"  he  gasped,  wondering  if  she  was  about 
to  take  legal  steps  to  separate  him  from  Floss. 

"Your  graduation  speech.  I  happened  to 
remember  an  incident  in  the  life  of  Burke 
which  would  fit  splendidly  into  your  theme.  It 
wasn't  in  the  college  library,  so  I  took  the  first 
train  to  -  Chester,  what  in  the  world's  the 
matter?" 

When  he  had  partly  returned  to  his  senses 
he  was  aware  that  she  was  holding  him  up 
against  the  stone  lintel  of  the  entrance.  San 
Francisco  was  going  round  and  round,  and  in 
the  confusion  of  architecture,  hills,  street  cars, 
lawyers  —  he  could  see  her  face,  deathly  pale, 
peering  at  him. 

"What's  wrong?  What  have  you  done? 
What  -  " 

"Carlotta,  haven't  you  heard?"  he  managed 


THE  SHALLOWS  OF  HAPPINESS        93 

to  say;  but  already  he  had  clinched  the  steel  for 
a  blow. 

"I  only  knew  you'd  gone  away.  Your 
mother " 

"I'm  not  coming  back.  I'm  sorry,  Carlotta. 
I'll  never  make  any  speech.  That's  all  over." 

"Chester,  I  can't  understand.  You  were 
going  ahead  with  everything  last  week.  If  you 
think  I've  interfered  too  much " 

"You  would  have  been  the  making  of  me/' 
he  murmured;  "of  me  or  any  other  man." 

The  heartfelt  praise  had  gone  well  over  her 
tragic  head,  it  seemed,  for  her  face  tightened 
and  her  dark  eyes  were  regarding  him  with  a 
look  which  was  hells  deep  in  its  scorn. 

"Why  aren't  you  coming  back?  What  have 
you  done?" 

"I  ran  away  and — got  married." 

She  paused  just  a  second. 

"Oh." 

"Florabel  Brannon." 

It  was  brief  and  straight  to  the  sharpened 
point  which  he  dug  into  her  heart. 

"I  didn't  know — you  would  go  that  way," 
she  told  him  in  the  queerest  tone  in  the  world ; 
and  without  another  word  she  walked  down 
the  stone  steps. 


94* THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Her  exit  from  his  life  was  as  somber  and  as 
proud  as  the  departure  of  Medea  from  Jason's 
unworthy  palace. 

"Car " 

He  tried  to  call  after  hen  but  his  throat  was 
ashes. 

At  half  past  twelve  he  hunted  up  the  expen 
sive  Poodle  Dog  and  found  Floss  accusing  him 
out  of  her  brilliant  eyes. 

"Do  you  know  what  you  look  like?"  she 
asked.  "You  look  the  way  The  Lost  Chord 
sounds  on  a  jew's-harp — sort  of  thin  and  sour. 
I've  had  a  bum  morning  too.  Poor  Mr.  Blink 
cried  when  I  told  him.  I  hate  to  make  a  fat 
man  cry.  He's  got  a  sort  of  absorbent  com 
plexion,  you  know — seems  to  take  up  moisture 
like  a  blotter.  Aren't  you  most  starved?" 

"I  guess  so,"  mumbled  the  happy  groom. 
"What  about  my  job?" 

"Oh,  yes.  I  got  so  sorry  for  Mr.  Blink  that 
I  nearly  forgot  to  ask  him.  But  it's  all  settled. 
Twenty  a  week  to  begin  with.  Start  work 
Monday." 

Aunt  Het  had  been  right  when  she  had 
accused  Floss  of  playing  a  system. 


CHAPTER  VI 

BOTTLED  BLUSHES 

IT  WAS  an  early  morning  in  June,  at  about 
the  time  when  Chester  came  to  the  conclusion 
that  he  hated  Mr.  Blink  almost  as  much  as  he 
loved  the  little  imp  who  had  introduced  him  to 
the  monster.  Dressed  for  the  office  the  bud 
ding  insurance  man  sat  fussing  with  a  soft- 
boiled  egg.  Flossie  never  seemed  to  wake  up 
cross ;  and  at  this  moment  she  was  singing  as 
she  pinned  on  a  morning  cap  made  last  night 
from  an  old  lace  handkerchief  and  rosettes  de 
vised  from  scraps  of  lingerie  ribbon.  So  fresh 
she  looked  and  so  blooming  and  rosy  you  would 
never  have  thought  that  she  had  anything  on 
her  mind  weightier  than  the  impromptu  trifle. 

For  her  Goober's  benefit  she  was  buttering  a 
slice  of  toast,  which  she  had  warmed  over  a 
patent  gas  toaster,  smuggled  in  under  Aunt 
Het's  very  nose.  Chester  was  considering  his 
case  again. 

"It's  that  orator  who  stands  in  front  of  the 

95 


96  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Public  Library  selling  soap,"  she  said  apropos 
of  nothing.  "He's  been  arrested  again.  As 
though  it  could  be  a  crime  to  sell  soap  any 
where,  even  in  church." 

"You  had  some  sort  of  idea  connected  with 
the  Public  Library,  didn't  you?"  asked  her  hus 
band,  fishing  for  a  scrap  of  eggshell  as  though 
to  remove  from  his  life  an  unpleasant  memory. 

"Do  you  feel  pretty  well,  Goober?  Sort  of 
strong  and  powerful  and  ready  to  receive?" 
she  inquired,  handing  him  over  his  toast. 

"Receive  what?"  Floss'  method  of  attack 
was  making  him  wary. 

"Oh,  everything — strokes  of  lightning  and 
things." 

"You  haven't  got  me  a  job  selling  soap  in 
front  of  the  library?"  he  temporized. 

"Old  Brutal !  You  couldn't  do  that— you're 
not  eloquent  enough." 

"Thanks.  However,  I'm  pretty  strong  this 
morning." 

"Huroo !  Then  I've  got  our  future  all  in  a 
wad." 

She  went  capering  over  to  one  of  Aunt  Het's 
hermaphrodite  bookcases  and  out  of  a  walnut 
drawer  she  brought  a  scrap  of  paper  which 
looked  as  though  it  had  been  torn  from  Noah's 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  97 

own  notebook.    She  dropped  it  beside  the  tray. 

"What's  this  ?"  asked  the  enamored  one,  try 
ing  to  look  practical,  which  was  impossible  be 
cause  she  had  got  behind  him  and  was  tucking 
the  ends  of  his  necktie  into  his  collar.  The 
scrap  of  paper,  he  could  see,  was  ruled  in  blue 
lines  and  all  scribbled  over  with  faded  ink. 

"Old  Nuisance !    That's  my  complexion." 

"Your  which?" 

He  tried  to  disentangle  the  arms  round  his 
neck,  for  her  complexion  was  at  that  instant 
in  a  most  unseeable  position,  its  round  little 
chin  balanced  against  the  top  of  his  head. 

"We've  got  to  get  rich,  Goober,"  she  decided 
a  moment  later,  as  soon  as  she  had  nestled  her 
complexion  into  the  hollow  of  his  shoulder  and 
was  in  a  position  to  speak  down  his  collar. 
"We've  got  to  make  millions  and  squillions  so 
that  we  can  drive  round  town  in  a  golden  char 
iot  and  show  the  diamond  settings  in  our  teeth 
to  the  poor.  The  poky  old  insurance  won't  give 
us  a  decent  salary  until  we're  too  old  and  sensi 
ble  to  care  about  money.  Besides,  you'll  never 
succeed  in  the  insurance  business." 

"Why  not,  cutie?" 

"Because  you're  not  a  good  enough  talker." 

He  winced. 


98  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Thanks  again/'  he  said. 

"You  know,  Goober,  there's  more  than  one 
woman  in  the  world  who  can  teach  you  to  hit 
the  high  places " 

Good  heavens!  How  like  a  burlesque  of 
Carlotta's  ideal! 

"I'm  not  going  to  let  my  candy  husband  play 
second  trombone  to  anybody,  not  in  all  this 
awful  big  green  world,"  the  childish  innocence 
of  her  voice  went  on.  "I'm  going  to  make  a 
regular  normulous  hit  out  of  my  Goober.  I 
want  to  see  my  sweetheart's  picture  stuck  up 
on  every  billboard  all  over  the  universe.  And 
I'm  the  girl  that  can  put  it  there." 

"Of  course  you  can.  I'm  sure  you  can,"  he 
said  in  the  tone  of  the  half  convinced. 

"I  don't  mean  Shakespere  or  any  of  those 
mighty  uggles.  But  I  can  make  Goober  so  great 
he'll  just  pop  out  of  his  clothes." 

"But  how  about  your  complexion?"  he  in 
sisted,  being  ever  logic- 1.  Her  stranglehold 
permitted  him  to  peep  down  at  the  scrap  of 
paper  whose  brownish  script  looked  like  a 
recipe  for  an  English  plum  pudding. 

"It's  ev-erything,"  she  told  him  in  her  best 
baby  drawl. 

"Not  going  on  the  stage  ?" 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  99 

"Horrid  old  stage.  Nopey,  nopey!  I 
wouldn't  just  even  think  of  such  a  thing." 

"But  you  can't  take  your  complexion  off  and 
sell  it."  Which  was  rather  a  light  sally  for 
Chester  A.  Framm. 

"Now,  Cicero!  We've  been  married  most 
two  months.  Where  do  you  think  my  complex 
ion  comes  from?" 

The  suggestion  gave  him  a  shock.  On  a 
bureau  beyond  the  bedroom  door  he  caught  a 
glimpse  of  the  white  jars  and  frivolous  bottles 
whose  uses  he  had  never  looked  into.  He  re 
membered  his  mother's  diatribe  to  the  effect 
that  the  yellow-haired  chit  painted  and  pow 
dered  and  smoked  cigarettes. 

"All  women  use  cold  cream,"  he  loyally  in 
sisted  to  the  cheek  so  tightly  pressed  against 
his. 

"OldSillicumr 

"Florabel !"  He  spoke  it  sternly.  "Let  me 
look  at  you." 

She  stood  away  for  inspection.  Mona  Lisa 
never  did  a  better  bit  of  smiling  than  did  Flora 
bel  Framm  as  she  folded  her  white  and  useless 
hands  across  the  fluffy  front  of  her  peignoir 
and  turned  her  sweet  cheeks  slowly — now  right, 
now  left.  Perfection !  Does  Nature  rouge  the 


100  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

tea  rose  or  rice-powder  the  early  mignonette? 
Her  cheeks  held  the  same  color  that  he  had 
first  noticed  in  them  the  day  he  led  her  along 
the  footpath  behind  the  bleachers — cheeks  of  a 
small  child  playing  in  the  wind. 

"Floss/'  he  cried,  "either  you're  a  little  fraud 
or  a  great  artist." 

"I  ain't  neither  of  those  things,"  she  chirped. 
"I'm  a  great  chemist,  that's  what  I  am." 

"You're  a  great  something,  that's  sure,"  he 
admitted — and  that  is  about  as  far  as  his  diag 
nosis  got  in  all  his  married  life. 

"Angel  Bloom  Complexion  Cream,"  she  rat 
tled  on.  "That's  the  name  I  got  for  it.  It's 
invisible,  you  know — just  sort  of  oozes  through 
the  way  currant  jelly  shows  under  whipped 


cream." 


"Who  ever  told  you  all  that?" 

"My  grandmother.  She  was  so  famous  for 
her  complexion  that  two  or  three  army  officers 
shot  themselves — or  each  other,  I've  forgotten 
which — just  because  she  was  so  adorable. 
When  I  was  eleven  years  old  and  went  down 
to  visit  her  in  Roanoke  she  told  me  right 
straight  on  her  deathbed — it  was  a  sort  of  a 
deathbed,  because  she  never  got  up  for  ten 
years,  except  once  when  she  went  to  a  horse 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  101 

race — she  told  me  all  about  Angel  Bloom  and 
said  it  was  nev-er,  nev-er  too  early  to  begin 
to  be  fascinating." 

"And  she  wrote  it  out  for  you?" 

''It's  all  down  there  in  her  handwriting." 

Grandmother  certainly  wrote  an  obscure 
hand.  After  a  session  of  eye  strain  he  man 
aged  to  make  out  such  phrases  as  "slow  fire" 
and  "be  sparing  with  suet,"  which  sounded  to 
him  not  in  the  least  complexional. 

"So  that's  the  idea,"  he  grunted,  not  thinking 
much  about  it  one  way  or  the  other. 

"Yeah ;  that  and  my  complexion." 

"Your  complexion?" 

"Can't  you  see  what  a  fine  ad  it  would  make, 
Goob?  I've  got  the  loveliest  coloring  in  Amer 
ica,  on  or  off  the  stage.  Now  that  point's 
settled.  Well,  we're  a  corporation — the  Framm 
Complexion  Company  Ink." 

"Company  what?" 

"Ink,"  she  chimed.  "They  always  stick  that 
on  corporations  to  make  them  sound  honest. 
I've  made  you  president  and  I'll  be  secretary, 
treasurer  and  general  manager " 

"Don't  let's  talk  nonsense,  darling,"  he 
warned  her  from  his  lofty  height. 


103  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"I  don't  know  how/'  she  replied  just  as 
though  she  meant  it.  "I  know  you're  just  itcK- 
ing  to  get  down  to  the  insurance.  But  just 
look  what  I  made/' 

This  time  she  fished  under  the  Bagdad  cover 
of  a  divan,  and  the  object  she  produced  was 
three  feet  long  and  of  limp  cardboard.  It  was 
a  sorrowful  inspection  he  gave  the  work  of  art. 
He  hadn't  thought  even  Floss  would  have  the 
heart  to  do  that — and  her  best,  her  reverenced, 
her  adored  photograph !  It  was  the  picture  she 
had  given  him  on  the  day  of  their  wedding, 
showing  Florabel  in  an  evening  gown,  her  hair 
done  in  a  Psyche  knot,  and  with  that  piquant 
smile  on  her  kissable  mouth. 

ffWell,  what  will  you  be  doing  next?"  he 
groaned.  This  of  course  was  an  unfair  ques 
tion. 

She  had  pasted  the  photograph  in  the  very 
center  of  the  composition  and  surrounded  it 
with  a  legend  printed  out  in  her  ill- formed 
letters. 

DON'T  You  LOVE  A  PEACH? 

That  was  the  challenge  above  the  photo 
graph,  and  below : 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  103 

I'M  THE  FRAMM  COMPLEXION  GIRL 

ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  DID  IT 
TRY  ME  50C  INSIDE 

"I  like  it  all  but  the  'Try  me.  Fifty  cents 
inside/  "  she  said,  perking  her  head  critically. 
"That  sounds  too  much  like  selling  tickets  to 
typhoid  germs.  Isn't  it  soo-purb?" 

"It's  superbly  idiotic/'  he  groaned. 

"That's  what's  so  charming  about  it.  And 
I've  saved  sixty  dollars  out  of  your  wages. 
That'll  pay  for  the  first  advertising.  Then 
you'll  resign  from  the  insurance  and " 

"See  here,  Floss!"  Here  sounded  the  first 
note  of  a  lover's  quarrel.  "There's  got  to  be 
a  limit  somewhere.  I'm  willing  to  drop  my 
ambitions  and  go  into  business  for  you;  I'm 
willing  to  work  and  slave  for  you;  but  I'll  be 
perpetually  damned  if  Fm  going  to  let  you 
turn  me  into  a  hairdresser." 

"There's  oodles  of  money  in  hairdressing," 
she  pointed  out  quite  placidly.  "But  you 
wouldn't  make  such  a  good  one  as  you  would 
before  I  made  you  get  a  haircut." 

She  was  combing  her  fingers  through  his 


104  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

shorn  locks  when  he  prevented  her  gently  but 
firmly  and  put  on  his  hat. 

"You  haven't  even  kissed  me  once/'  she 
pouted  at  the  door.  He  paused  long  enough 
to  attend  to  that. 

Chester  took  his  way  toward  the  Invisible 
Life  Insurance  Company  every  morning  with 
the  feelings  of  a  man  whom  someone  has  pleas 
antly  drugged,  then  sent  to  slow  torment.  All 
through  the  day  he  was  baited  along  by  the  idea 
"I'm  doing  it  for  Floss,"  and  the  thought  helped 
speed  him  through  the  heavy  seas  of  figures 
which  were  deadly  dull  to  the  oratorical  mind. 
Sometimes  Satan  would  walk  in  through  the 
prosperous  glass-and-mahogany  partitions  and 
remind  him  of  his  better  self — the  self  which 
Carlotta,  had  he  chosen,  might  be  even  now 
lifting  upward,  upward  to  the  heights  where 
thought  is  golden  and  speech  is  inspired. 

Sometimes  in  the  hall  Chester  would  en 
counter  Graham  V.  Applethwaite,  the  gentle 
man  whom  Florabel  had  boiled  down  to  Mr. 
Blink,  then  discarded.  He  was  a  swollen  old 
bachelor  who  rather  resembled  our  popular  idea 
of  a  trust  save  for  the  fact  that  his  eyes  were 
entirely  concealed  behind  plate-glass  spectacles. 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  105 

When  he  met  his  earnest  employee,  if  he  saw 
him  at  all,  he  would  give  him  a  charitable, 
patronizing  smile,  a  smile  which  crushed.  Ches 
ter  hated  it.  It  would  be  well  if  all  unsuccess 
ful  lovers  could  adopt  toward  their  victors  a 
smile  like  Mr.  Blink's. 

In  his  work  Chester  had  no  compass  whereby 
to  guide  him.  He  merely  knew  that  he  got 
through  the  days  and  fairly  ran  home  to  Floss, 
who  always  had  a  program  arranged  for  the 
evening  and  never  allowed  him  much  time  to 
think.  Sometimes  they  would  spend  the  eve 
ning  playing  poker  with  young  things  of  Floss* 
own  caliber.  Floss,  who  played  like  a  prodi 
gal,  usually  won,  which  balanced  things  for 
him  at  the  end  of  the  week.  Often  they  would 
go  to  the  theater  with  Aunt  Het,  who  always 
bought  the  tickets  and  insisted  on  vaudeville 
or  musical  comedy  with  an  occasional  dash  of 
burlesque;  the  Spirit  World  seldom  interfered 
with  her  earthly  pleasures.  She  was  an  incor 
rigible  trifler,  was  Aunt  Het,  and  as  such  sel 
dom  failed  to  make  herself  amusing. 

But  the  week  following  the  interview  in 
which  Floss  elected  her  Chester  to  the  presi 
dency  of  the  Framm  Complexion  Company  Ink, 
found  little  Mrs.  Framm  disinclined  to  amuse- 


106  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEE 

ments  in  the  after-dinner  hours.  She  looked 
actually  tired.  Once  she  appeared  with  her 
useless  forefinger  tied  up  in  a  cotton  rag;  she 
consented  to  having  it  unwrapped  and  showed 
a  long  savage  burn  which  she  wanted  kissed 
so  that  it  would  get  well.  A  sweetish,  not 
unpleasant  odor  seemed  to  overhang  the  at 
mosphere  in  their  third-floor  suite.  He  never 
remembered  Floss'  using  such  a  perfume — and 
so  much  of  it. 

One  morning  Chester's  bare  toe  came  pain 
fully  against  some  brittle  object  which  seemed 
to  have  popped  out  from  under  the  bed.  It 
was  a  long-necked,  round-bellied  bottle,  a  silly 
thing  with  roses  blown  into  the  glass. 

"How  did  this  get  here?"  he  asked,  holding 
it  up. 

"It  just  would,"  drawled  Floss  from  her 
pillows.  This  was  one  of  the  times  when  she 
wouldn't  get  up. 

"Looks  sort  of  funny  to  me,"  he  growled, 
for  he  was  entertaining  his  suspicions. 

"Maybe  I'm  a  secret  drunkard,"  said  she. 
"But  I  never  could  make  out  how  anybody 
could  be  a  secret  drunkard — I  can  always  smell 
it  a  block  off.  Kiss  me,  nuisance,  and  please 
don't  slam  the  door  when  you  go  out." 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  107 

It  was  on  his  way  home  that  very  night  that 
some  fate  caused  him  to  stare  into  the  vulgar 
solution  of  his  mystery.  On  one  of  the  sidehill 
streets  at  a  corner  less  than  two  blocks  from 
Aunt  Het's  abode  there  stood  an  old-fashioned 
drug  store  of  about  the  third  grade.  It  had 
a  handsome  sign  lettered  Holbetter's  Phar 
macy  and  a  gilded  mortar  and  pestle  over  the 
door.  The  place  was  in  a  basement,  two  steps 
down  from  the  sidewalk,  and  its  cramped  pro 
portions  plainly  indicated  Doctor  Holbetter's 
status  in  the  apothecarial  world. 

Fate  reminded  Chester  of  a  tube  of  tooth 
paste.  He  paused.  There  is  no  druggist,  be 
he  ever  so  humble,  who  does  not  handle  tooth 
paste.  Chester  A.  Framm  got  his  eyes  as  far 
as  the  scrawny  show  window,  and  then  came 
recognition.  It  was  as  though  he  had  found 
a  friend  in  the  morgue.  A  dozen  round-bellied, 
long-necked  bottles,  similar  to  the  one  he  had 
kicked  under  his  wife's  bed,  stood  boldly  in  a 
row.  A  large  window  card  printed  in  red  and 
white  occupied  the  place  of  honor  at  center — 
Flossy's  picture! 

DON'T  You  LOVE  A  PEACH  ? 


108  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL  _ 

It  was  printed  in  black  and  red  and  had  the 
look  of  permanency  and  authority  which  bold 
face  type  is  apt  to  give.  The  Framm  Com 
plexion  Girl  was  announced  in  all  her  impu 
dence,  but  her  unsatisfactory  line  about  Try  Me 
had  been  dignified  and  repressed  to  Trial  Size, 


Chester  went  into  the  shabby  interior,  and 
assuming  the  guilty  nonchalance  of  a  detective 
brought  forth  the  proprietor,  who  came  briskly 
out  from  behind  a  weather-beaten  glass  screen. 
He  was  a  leathery  little  mild-featured  gentle 
man  who  affected  the  style  of  hair  and  goatee 
made  famous  by  the  late  Colonel  Cody. 

The  druggist,  who  proved  to  be  Doctor  Hoi- 
better  himself,  chewed  nervously  as  he  served 
his  customer  with  an  obsolete  brand  of  tooth 
paste. 

"By  the  way,"  drawled  Chester,  trying  to 
look  innocent  as  he  pocketed  his  change, 
"what's  this  complexion  stuff  you're  showing 
in  the  window  ?" 

"Angel  Bloom?"  The  druggist  had  a 
nervous,  staccato  delivery,  punctuated  by  a 
click-clicking  sound  which  he  made  in  the  side 
of  his  cheek  as  though  urging  a  tired  horse. 
"Latest  thing.  Yes,  sir.  Lady  to  improve  and 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  109 

*m*m**im^>m^^^^^^^i^*mmmm*m~~>m***ii>~m^*mmmmm*^m^^^i^**mi'*'*mmiim'immmi^^*imi^ 

beautify?  Can't  do  better.  Guaranteed." 
Click-click. 

"A  new  thing?" 

"Absolutely.  Only  put  it  out  yesterday.  Sold 
four  bottles  right  off  the  reel.  Theatrical 
people." 

"Your  own  invention,  I  suppose?" 

Doctor  Holbetter  had  now  rounded  the  coun 
ter  and  taken  a  bottle  from  the  row  in  the 
window. 

"All  we've  got  in  stock."  Click-click.  He 
tipped  the  bottle  to  show  its  contents,  which 
were  pinkish  in  color  and  of  the  consistency  of 
skim  milk.  "Interest  in  the  concern.  Discov 
ered  by  a  lady.  Secret  formula.  See  her  pic 
ture  in  the  window?  Pretty  good!  With  a 
face  like  that  she  could  sell  ham  in  a  synagogue. 
Real  nice  lotion.  Serious  medicine.  Merit  in 
it.  Wholesale,  proper  advertising " 

"I've  got  plenty  at  home,"  said  Chester,  back 
ing  away  from  the  bottle  which  the  druggist 
was  evidently  trying  to  force  on  him. 

"Never  regret  it.  Actress  came  in  for  second 
bottle.  Wanted  it  for  sister.  Just  get  this 
thing  on  the  wholesale " 

Flossie  on  the  wholesale !  That  was  the  way 
her  shocked  husband  took  it  as  he  charged  home 


110  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

and  found  her  serenely  ripping  the  fur  from  a 
hat  he  didn't  recognize.  She  sat  by  a  window 
and  the  gold  of  a  late  afternoon  was  mingling 
with  the  gold  of  her  hair,  which  was  slightly 
tousled.  The  strips  of  fur,  as  she  ripped  them 
off  the  frame,  made  exciting  sounds  like  ex 
plosions  of  distant  firecrackers.  Her  eyes 
were  downcast;  she  was  in  a  dream.  Women 
engaged  with  fancywork  always  look  like 
Madonnas. 

"See  here,  Floss,"  was  the  way  Framm  burst 
into  the  picture,  "who's  that  man,  Holbetter?" 

"Buffalo  Willie,  you  mean?"  asked  she, 
pressing  a  velvet  rose  with  her  thumb  against 
the  frame  as  she  held  the  confection  at  arm's 
length  and  considered  the  effect.  "Why,  he's 
vice  president  of  the  Ink." 

"H-m.  Apparently  you  and  your  Buffalo 
Willie  are  doing  splendidly  with  this  thing  you 
call  your  Ink." 

"Don't  be  jealous,  Old  Brutal.  We've  made 
you  president,  you  got  to  admit.  Don't  you 
remember  away  back  in  Dyak  how  you  longed 
to  be  President?" 

Another  dig  at  the  late  Carlotta  apparently. 

"Your  picture  in  a  drug-store  window!"  he 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  111 

snorted.  "Why  didn't  you  put  yourself  in  a 
circus  poster  and  be  done  with  it  ?" 

"I  thought  of  that/'  She  had  apparently 
decided  on  the  velvet  rose,  for  she  was  now 
sewing  it  rapidly  to  the  brim.  "But  when  you 
make  circus  posters  you've  got  to  have  money 
for  regular  art.  What  we  need's  capital,  Goob. 
So  I  went  round  to  the  printer  with  my  sixty 
dollars.  He  soaked  me  twenty-two  for  fifty 
printed  cards.  I  wanted  to  have  my  picture 
in  colors,  but  he  said  that  would  mean  lithog 
raphy.  Every  kind  of  graphy  is  horrid  expen 
sive,  so  I  just  painted  my  photos  with  water 
colors  and  pasted  'em  onto  the  cards.  You 
know  they're  pretty.  You  told  me  once  that 
my  picture  was  lovelier  than  Venus  or  ice 
cream  or  anything.  Didn't  you?" 

"Well,  what  if  I  did?" 

Wasn't  that  like  Floss? 

"Come  here  and  kiss  me  twice."  He  did, 
and  as  usual  experienced  her  charm.  "How 
did  you  like  our  Angel  Bloom?" 

"It's  all  right,  I  guess.  But  what  is  it? 
Where  did  it  come  from?" 

•"I  cooked  it  over  the  gas  heater.  I  nearly 
burned  the  house  down  two  or  three  times — 
it  was  more  fun.  And  then  I  didn't  have  any 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


bottles  or  labels  and  things.  So  I  went  round 
to  Doctor  Holbetter  —  he  admits  he's  a  doctor 
—  and  made  him  vice  president.  It  seems  he 
had  a  hundred  and  forty-four  empty  bottles 
out  back  of  the  store.  They  used  to  contain 
Holbetter's  Canine  Flea  Solution.  It  seems 
that  dogs  don't  have  that  kind  of  flea  any  more, 
so  Buffalo  Willie  was  holding  those  empties  till 
he  thought  up  some  other  wonderful  invention. 
I  told  the  old  darling  all  about  Angel  Bloom 
and  he  promised  to  give  me  twelve  dozen  emp 
ties  for  one  dozen  fulls.  Isn't  he  a  sweet 
heart?" 

The  druggist,  as  Chester  recalled  him,  had 
been  a  withered  remnant  reeking  of  aloes,  sug 
gestive  of  mummification. 

"And  oh,  my  own  indispensable  Goob  !"  She 
had  scattered  her  trimming  to  the  four  winds, 
and  flying  to  him  had  thrown  herself  into  his 
lap.  "I'm  oozing  ideas.  The  big  Boston  Drug 
Store  on  Kearney  Street  have  promised  to  take 
two  dozen  and  my  picture  for  their  window. 
I've  been  filling  bottles  all  day  in  the  factory  —  " 

-"Factory?" 

"The  trunk  room,  foolish!" 

With  a  uselessly  slippered  toe  she  indicated 


BOTTLED  BLUSHES  11& 

the  little  room  that  had  been  smelling  of 
strange  scents  this  mysterious  week. 

"How  much  does  it  cost  you  to  make  the 
stuff?"  he  solemnly  inquired. 

"Twenty-one  cents  a  bottle.  It  wholesales 
for  twenty- four." 

"Well  then,  you'll  clear  four  dollars  and 
thirty-two  cents,  maybe,  if  you  can  sell  the 
whole  gross,"  he  encouraged  her,  after  com 
putation. 

"Lunk !"  she  whispered. 

"Am  I  wrong?" 

"Yeppy.  We  ain't  going  to  be  wholesalers 
until  we're  big  and  strong." 

"What  are  we  going  to  be  ?" 

"It's  won-derful,  Cicero !  I've  got  our  whole 
life  settled.  We're  going  to  move  into  a  cute 
little  flat  over  a  store — Framm's  Angel  Bloom 
Parlor — and  folks  will  come  from  miles  round 
asking,  'Who  is  this  complexion  girl?'  and  I'll 
come  out  with  a  bottle  in  each  hand  and  say, 
'Only  me !'  Isn't  it  all  too  lovely  for  words  ?" 

"Yes,  indeed !  And  who's  going  to  pay  the 
rent  on  this  paradise?" 

"Oh,  you  and  me  and  Buffalo  Willie." 

"I  see.  And  just  what  status  will  I  have 
round  the  place?" 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


"Why,  Goober!    Haven't  you  guessed?" 

"Can't  imagine/' 

"You're  going  to  be  the  cheese.  You'll  wear 
a  new  necktie  every  hour  and  show  the  ladies 
round  the  place  and  bring  me  out  as  a  sample. 
Don't  you  savvy?  I'm  planning  this  all  for 
your  dear  little  sweet  sake." 

"By  Jupiter  !"  He  came  standing  and  shook 
her  off  his  lap. 

"You're  getting  mad  again,"  she  discovered, 
pouting  slightly. 

"I'll  not  do  it  !"  he  roared.  "I  simply  won't 
have  anything  to  do  with  this  silly,  undignified, 
dishonest  performance.  I  simply  won't,  that's 
all!" 


CHAPTER  VII 

CASTAWAYS 

BUT  what  does  one  do  when  Fate  is  fighting 
on  the  other  side?  Fight  on  and  be  defeated 
or  accept  the  alternative,  which  is  disarma 
ment. 

It  was  on  a  Wednesday  when  Chester  A. 
Framm  frowned  upon  the  sacrilege  in  Doctor 
Holbetter's  grubby  show  window.  Thursday 
dawned  bright  and  fair,  with  Chester  already 
ashamed  of  his  loss  of  temper.  Flossie  never 
lost  her  temper;  she  was  very  patient  with 
him.  He  couldn't  bear  to  go  away  and  leave 
those  ill  words  behind.  Therefore  their  morn 
ing's  reconciliation  was  heartfelt  and  long. 
Flossie  cried  quite  becomingly,  thus  mangling 
his  soul  to  a  shapeless  substance  as  though  it 
had  been  run  through  a  meat  chopper.  He 
grew  eloquent  in  his  descriptions  of  the  kinds 
of  brute  he  had  been.  She  admitted  it  and 
punctuated  her  protestations  of  love  with  little 
heart-tearing  sobs. 

"5 


116  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Chester  was  late  at  the  office,  but  he  got 
there  warm  with  the  knowledge  that  Flossie 
was  the  dearest  thing  in  all  the  world  and  that 
he  would  do  anything  for  her  short  of  becom 
ing  one  of  those  damned  hairdressers. 

In  the  early  afternoon  as  he  was  coming 
back  from  his  cheap  and  hurried  luncheon  he 
thought  he  saw  a  flash  of  her  pinkish  gown 
ruffling  its  way  into  a  trolley  car  at  the  corner 
beyond  the  Indivisible  Life  Building.  The  fact 
that  she  wore  an  unfamiliar  hat  merely  estab 
lished  her  identity.  He  was  intending  to  twit 
her  of  it,  jokingly  of  course,  but  that  night 
when  he  reached  their  upstairs  apartment  he 
found  her  dramatic  with  a  most  unusual  cau 
tion. 

"Hush!"  she  whispered.    "Aunt  Het!" 

"Aunt  Het— is  she  sick?" 

"Yeppy.    Sick  of  us." 

"What  have  we  done?" 

"Better  take  off  your  shoes,  sly  like  a  mouse. 
Put  on  your  felt  slippers  and  give  me  a  cig 
arette." 

She  tiptoed  over  and  locked  the  door,  then 
settled  down  on  the  divan,  her  eyes  wide  and 
scared. 

"Her  false  teeth  came  clean  plumb  out  so 


CASTAWAYS  117 


that  I  could  see  the  plate — you  know  the  way 
they  make  'em  to  look  like  the  roof  of  your 
mouth.  She  called  you  an  idler !" 

'That's  nice."  He  had  been  running  errands 
for  Flossie's  rejected  lover  all  day  and  every 
muscle  ached  for  rest.  "Reasonable  of  her, 
I'm  sure." 

"No,  it  ain't.  But  Aunt  Het  hasn't  got  to 
be  reasonable.  She's  a  Baha  worshiper." 

"What's  a  Baha  worshiper?" 

"Some  sort  of  religion  you  get  in  Southern 
California.  It  makes  people  awfully  funny. 
Last  night  she  got  a  vision  and  it  said  you  were 
a  minor  astrolabe.  Of  course  that  cooks  your 
goose.  She  came  round  with  a  regular  scene. 
She  wants  im-mediate  payment  for  a  month's 
board  and  lodging " 

"Are  we  that  far  behind?"  gasped  Chester, 
rather  vague  as  to  their  arrangements. 

"Well,  we  would  have  been  bang  up  to  the 
scratch  if  I  hadn't  spent  that  sixty  dollars  on 
drugs  and  chemicals." 

Numerous  empty,  full  and  half- full  Angel 
Bloom  bottles  strewed  the  place  and  told  the 
tale  of  extravagance. 

"Is  she  going  to  put  us  out?"  he  asked 
anxiously. 


118  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Not  necessarily.  When  we  go  down  to 
dinner  we'll  just  be  chickadees.  Maybe  she'll 
blow  over.  You  can't  imagine  how  many  times 
Aunt  Het's  blown  over." 

"You'll  get  round  her/'  he  beamed,  justified 
in  admiring  Flossie's  powers  of  get-roundness. 

They  dined  in  the  big  lofty  room  whose  main 
adornments  consisted  of  oil  paintings  of  Aunt 
Het's  three  late  husbands.  These  were  a  study 
in  progressive  styles.  Number  One  showed  a 
wide  open  collar  and  chin  beard,  Number  Two 
wore  drooping  mustaches  and  a  bang;  while 
Number  Three  was  smooth-shaven  and  by  his 
manner  of  dress  appeared  quite  recent.  Whis 
kered  or  smooth,  they  had  all  gone  their  way, 
and  their  common  widow,  still  going  strong, 
appeared  promptly  at  seven  to  take  her  place 
at  the  head  of  the  table. 

She  looked  calm,  Chester  thought  as  he 
pushed  her  chair  in  for  her.  During  these 
months  he  had  grown  to  regard  her  as  a  rollick 
ing  sort  of  person,  rather  fond  of  cheap  red 
wine  and  only  queer  as  to  her  parrot  and  her 
spirit  guides,  who  seemed  inoffensive  compan 
ions. 

"Chester,"  she  said  as  soon  as  her  woeful 
Chinaman  had  brought  in  the  soup,  "what  is 


CASTAWAYS  119 


it  you  have  on  your  feet  when  you  come  up 
the  stairs  in  the  afternoon?  Roller  skates?" 

Chester  blushed. 

"I  wasn't  aware "  he  began  with  dignity. 

'Tie's  never  aware,  Aunt  Het,"  chipped  in 
his  child  wife.  "That's  exactly  what  makes 
him  the  adorable  Goob." 

"You  shouldn't  take  such  things  so  lightly," 
the  old  woman  uttered  the  rebuke.  Apparently 
the  adorable  Goob  sounded  like  one  of  the  gods 
of  her  theology.  "But  I  shouldn't  be  disturbed 
at  half  past  five  in  the  afternoon. 

"You  must  attend  to  your  shoes,  Chester. 
Possibly  they  need  oiling." 

"I  sometimes  have  a  touch  of  nerves  myself," 
he  agreed,  remembering  Flossie's  formula — Be 
natural. 

"Who  ever  said  anything  about  my  nerves  ?" 

Her  eyes  had  hardened  to  small  twinkling 
dots  and  her  teeth  were  dropping,  dropping — 
a  most  alarming  sight. 

"I — I  wasn't  intending  any  offense,"  he  tried 
to  apologize.  "We  all  have  our  nerves." 

"What  have  you  to  be  nervous  about?"  she 
glared. 

What  had  come  over  the  woman  ?  Since  last 
he  had  seen  her  she  had  changed  from  an 


120  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

amiable  frivolous  thing  to  the  monster  he  now 
beheld. 

"Well,  my  work " 

"Work!  Do  you  call  what  you're  doing 
work?" 

"I'm  always  anxious  to  get  something  bet 
ter/'  Chester  was  game  to  the  last. 

"I'll  thank  you  not  to  mention  my  nerves 
hereafter!"  she  took  him  up  short.  "What's 
my  religion  for,  I  should  like  to  know  ?" 

Chester,  who  had  no  power  of  enlightening 
her,  held  his  peace.  But  the  moment  was  hor 
rible. 

"There's  the  fun-niest  pair  of  acrobats  at 
the  Orpheum,"  Flossie  struck  bravely  in,  quite 
easily  pretending  that  all  was  well  as  could  be. 

"What  can  they  do?"  inquired  Aunt  Het; 
and  this  was  all  the  more  astonishing  because 
her  look  became  tranquil  as  the  harvest  moon. 

"They  pretend  to  be  strong  men,"  she  gig 
gled.  "One  of  them  picks  up  a  thousand-pound 
weight  between  his  teeth,  and  just  when  you 
think  he's  going  to  crack  his  spinal  column  he 
drops  it — the  weight,  I  mean — and  it  turns  out 
to  be  rubber.  And  then  his  partner  comes  on 
and  lifts  him  right  up  over  his  head — all  with 
one  hand.  He  does  this  nine  or  ten  times. 


CASTAWAYS 


He's  attached  to  a  pulley,  don't  you  know.  It's 
too  grand !" 

"Let's  go,"  suggested  Flossie's  astonishing 
great-aunt;  and  at  that  moment  she  and  her 
niece  looked  enough  alike  to  be  twins. 

The  diverting  swindles  committed  to  fast 
music  by  the  Rubberneck  Tramps  at  the  Orphe- 
um  restored  Aunt  Het  to  her  happy  self  again, 
but  Chester's  heart  was  as  ice.  What  calamity 
did  her  recent  storm  portend?  She  had  made 
it  plain  enough  that  the  love  birds  in  her  esti 
mation  were  far  less  welcome  in  her  home  than 
was  Oscar  the  parrot.  An  uncertain  twenty 
dollars  a  week  stood  between  them  and  starva 
tion.  And  there  was  nothing  in  the  world  to 
prove  that  Chester  had  made  good  at  the  insur 
ance  business. 

Next  morning,  Friday,  it  was  cold.  He  took 
his  foggy  self  down  to  the  Indivisible  office  and 
had  mourned  two  hours  over  his  desk  before  he 
was  brought  to  by  the  voice  of  the  sleek  blond 
secretary,  a  bearer  of  Friday's  tidings. 

"Wanted  in  Mr.  Applethwaite's  office." 

Chester's  trembling  knees  got  him  as  far  as 
the  pompous  mahogany  desk  above  which  the 
upper  part  of  Mr.  Applethwaite's  body  loomed 
like  a  bust  of  Plutocracy.  Mr.  Blink's  face 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


wore  its  customary  patronizing  smile.  It  is  a 
peculiar  sensation  to  be  thus  outfaced  by  one's 
wife's  rejected  lover. 

"Er  —  Mr.  Framm,"  the  great  man  went 
straight  to  the  point,  "I  don't  think  we  can 
use  you  any  longer.  Er  -  " 

"You  mean  I'm  dismissed  !"  gasped  the  un 
fortunate. 

"Well,  yes.  I  should  say  you're  being  dis 
missed.  Possibly  some  time  in  the  future  -  " 

Chester's  feet  seemed  nailed  to  the  floor. 
Mr.  Blink  was  squinting  into  the  papers  on 
his  desk  and  there  appeared  nothing  for  it 
but  to  go. 

"This  is  pretty  sudden,  Mr.  Applethwaite," 
the  dismissed  one  was  so  rash  as  to  declare. 

"Yes.  Isn't  it  ?"  Merely  a  passing  comment 
on  the  weather. 

"Might  I  ask  if  I  have  given  satisfaction?" 

"You  might." 

"Of  course  if  I  haven't  I  should  like  to  know 
so  that  next  time  -  " 

"Please  don't  worry  about  that  point."  The 
sweetish  old  face  writhed  itself  into  a  smile. 
"I'm  sure  you've  been  quite  satisfactory.  Good 
day,  Mr.  Framm." 

When  Chester  got  down  into  windy  Market 


CASTAWAYS 


Street  he  had  an  impulse  to  go  back  to  Dyak 
and  implore  forgiveness  at  his  mother's  iron 
ing  board.  The  mood  passed.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  wild  horses  could  not  have  dragged  him 
away  from  the  younger  Mrs.  Framm.  But 
how  was  he  to  face  her?  How  could  he  tell 
her  that  he  had  made  a  failure  of  the  only 
possible  work  that  could  keep  them  from  star 
vation?  Then  resentment  got  him  by  the 
throat  It  served  him  right  for  twisting  him 
self  into  that  which  he  was  not,  for  jilting  his 
destiny — jilting  Carlotta. 

He  had  sought  the  cheap  success  from  which 
she  would  have  warned  him. 

It  was  no  great  walk  back  to  Aunt  Het's 
house.  His  mood,  attuned  to  the  whistling  of 
the  wind,  got  him  as  far  as  Holbetter's  Phar 
macy  before  he  looked  round  for  his  bearings. 
Turning  the  hilly  corner  he  came  in  sight  of 
that  high-stooped  ornate  fagade  behind  which 
he  and  Flossie  had  passed  the  first  fevered 
months  of  their  married  life. 

The  exterior  of  Aunt  Het's  house  looked 
more  cluttered  than  usual.  The  cause  was 
apparent  at  a  glance.  A  large  moving  van  and 
a  dirty  one-horse  hack  were  standing  against 
the  curb. 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


Vainly  struggling  with  his  apprehension 
Chester  almost  ran  toward  the  inscrutable 
group.  Behind  the  van  a  man  in  overalls  was 
just  shoving  a  table  under  the  sheltering  can 
opy.  It  was  the  very  marble-topped  monstros 
ity  that  had  held  his  breakfast  tray  these 
troubled  months  ! 

Flossie's  stylish  figure  was  seen  coming 
briskly  down  the  steps,  her  left  hand  carrying 
her  small  walrus-leather  bag,  her  right  clasp 
ing  Chester's  shabby  suitcase. 

"Hello,  Goob!"  she  cried,  cheerful  as  a 
cricket. 

"Floss!    What's  happened?" 

"Aunt  Het's  blown  up/'  replied  his  adorable 
torment.  "And  we're  being  evicted." 

"Oh,  yes,"  agreed  her  husband  with  fright 
ful  calm.  "And  who's  paying  for  this  van?" 

"AuntHet." 

"By  gad,  it's  an  outrage  !  I'll  see  her  about 
this.  I'll  -  " 

"Don't  let's  make  any  false  motions,"  she 
suggested.  "We've  got  an  awful  lot  to  do.  She 
was  very  sweet  and  insulting  and  generous. 
She  gave  me  all  the  old  furniture  she  couldn't 
use.  Besides,  you  can't  see  her.  She's  locked 
in  with  a  trance  medium." 


CASTAWAYS  125 


"Where  does  she  expect  us  to  go  now?" 
"Oh,  that's  all  fixed.    Your  hay  fever'll  get 
bad  again  standing  here  in  the  wind.     Come 


on." 


"Where?" 

The  van  began  to  move  away.  Flossie  had 
half  pushed  him  into  the  depths  of  the  cab. 
With  one  foot  on  the  curb  she  paused  and 
called  an  Eddy  Street  number  to  the  man  on 
the  box. 

But  when  they  had  gone  far  on  their  pil 
grimage  into  the  unknown  he  broke  down  and 
blurted:  "Floss,  what  are  we  going  to  do? 
I'm  fired.  Fired  cold!" 

"There,  there !  Did  bad  Blink  go  and  hurt 
my  Goober?  Don't  you  give  one  solitary 
whoop,  Old  Nuisance!" 

She  had  taken  his  head  in  her  arms  and 
was  soothing  it  against  her  soft  vivacious 
breast. 

" 'Cause  who  cares?  We  don't.  We're  glad, 
that's  what  we  are." 

"But  what  are  we  going  to  do?"  he  repeated, 
absolutely  vanquished. 

Her  reply,  if  she  had  intended  any,  was 
interrupted  by  the  behavior  of  the  hack.  It 
stopped  as  though  by  appointment  with  a  gild- 


126  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

ed  street  number  twinkling  through  the  gray 
afternoon.  Floss  had  opened  the  door,  per 
mitting  her  husband  to  crane  his  neck  a  little 
farther.  It  was  a  small  two-story  shop  build 
ing  which  he  saw,  a  trim  front  newly  painted 
in  dazzling  white.  Through  the  plaster-splat 
tered  panes  he  could  dimly  see  carpenters  at 
work  with  fresh  shelving.  But  it  was  the  sign, 
daintily  lettered  in  colonial  type  on  the  white 
board  over  the  door,  which  held  him  with  a 
wild  surmise! 

"FRAMM'S  ANGEL  BLOOM  SHOP" 

"Come  on,  Cicero/'  said  the  great  man's 
wife,  leading  him  by  the  hand  as  a  nurse  leads 
a  timid  child.  "There's  the  dearest  house 
keeping  apartment  upstairs,  and  we'll  paint 
Aunt  Het's  furniture  so  its  mother  wouldn't 
know  it." 

"Floss,"  he  said;  and  barred  her  way.  "I 
believe  you  got  old  Applethwaite  to  fire  me." 

"Do  you?"  Her  face  was  aglow  with  what 
at  that  moment  looked  like  pride  and  affection. 

Lumbering  down  Eddy  Street  he  could  see 
the  moving  van,  replete  with  furniture  which 
Aunt  Het — despite  her  berserk  rage — had  con 
tributed. 


CASTAWAYS  127 


"Floss,"  he  persisted,  "I  wonder  if  I'll  ever 
get  used  to  you." 

"If  you  do,"  she  warned  him,  "I'll  get  a 
divorce." 


CHAPTER  VIII 

BUFFALO  WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS 

IT  WAS  in  the  fall  and  Chester  A.  Framm 
had  just  got  back  from  Los  Angeles  after 
a  moderately  successful  tour  introducing 
Framm's  Magic  Hair  Gloss  together  with  the 
now  standardized  Angel  Bloom  Cream. 
Shamelessly,  too,  he  had  overseen  the  distribu 
tion  of  Flossie's  latest  advertising  novelty  en 
titled  Mr.  Framm  Knows  a  Pretty  Girl  When 
He  Sees  One.  The  poster  showed  Chester  at 
center-card  holding  hands  with  the  Venus  de 
Milo — artfully  provided  with  white-gloved 
arms — and  with  Miss  Vivian  Hussel,  the  most 
popular  beauty  on  the  American  musical- 
comedy  stage.  Vivian  had  been  harder  to 
coax  into  the  picture  than  had  Venus,  but 
Floss  had  seen  to  it  in  her  own  sweet  way. 

On  the  morning  of  his  return  to  San  Fran 
cisco  he  had  again  been  astonished,  for  the 
black-and-white  front  of  the  beauty  shop,  over 
which  he  had  presided  with  capable  efficiency, 

128 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS 


was  undergoing  another  change.  A  house 
painter  on  his  ladder  occupied  a  prominent 
place  outside  the  show  window,  whose  sash 
slats  he  was  at  that  moment  streaking  with 
vermilion  paint.  Mrs.  Chester  A.  Framm, 
modishly  attired  in  a  tight-fitting  suit  of  blue, 
stood  on  the  sidewalk  in  affable  conversation 
with  a  jet-spangled  old  lady  who,  as  she  talked, 
wagged  in  her  right  hand  a  huge  bird  cage  con 
taining  an  enormous  red-and-green  parrot. 
Half  a  block  away  Chester  recognized  Flossie's 
new  acquisitions  —  Aunt  Het  and  her  familiar 
fiend  Oscar. 

"Lord  sake!  Lord  sake!"  shrieked  the 
winged  devil,  holding  himself  upside  down  by 
his  unbreakable  beak. 

"Why,  Aunt  Het  !"  exclaimed  Chester  as  he 
reached  forward  and  did  his  duty  by  the  smil 
ing  cheek  she  presented  for  his  kiss. 

"Goob,  dear/'  urged  Flossie,  almost  before 
the  salutation  had  been  repeated  on  her  own 
smooth  lips,  "won't  you  please  take  Oscar  over 
and  hold  him  up  next  to  the  paint?" 

"Next  to  the  paint?"  asked  Chester  blankly 
as  he  took  the  bird  cage  in  his  helpless  hand. 

"We're  trying  to  match  him,"  explained  his 


130  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

wife.  "And  please  don't  argue — Mr.  Horn's 
charging  us  by  the  hour." 

Framm  took  the  shrieking  Oscar  over  and 
held  him  next  to  the  paint,  per  instructions. 

"Mr.  Horn,"  tactfully  suggested  Aunt  Het 
to  the  house  painter,  "don't  you  think  we'd 
better  try  a  little  blue  in  the  red — Oscar's 
wings  aren't  at  all  the  shade  you're  using." 

"Color-blind,  old  sweetheart!"  pronounced 
Floss.  "Don't  you  pay  any  attention  to  Aunt 
Het,  Mr.  Horn." 

Mr.  Horn,  who  showed  a  scabby  face  under 
a  derby  hat  which  he  had  punched  full  of  holes, 
apparently  for  ventilation,  stood  patiently  aside 
and  compared  Oscar's  wings  with  the  vermilion 
on  the  window  slats. 

"A  little  yella  would  fix  it,  I  guess,"  he  voted. 

"There !"  crowed  Floss  triumphantly.  "That's 
what  comes  of  being  an  artist.  Oscar's  scarlet, 
isn't  he,  Mr.  Horn?  And  his  tail  isn't  sage 
green  like  that  stripe  under  the  sign.  It's  apple 
green,  isn't  it,  Mr.  Horn?  There  now,  Aunt 
Het.  See  what  you  almost  did !  And  you've 
lived  with  Oscar  all  these  years  and  never  saw 
him  in  his  true  colors!" 

"He's  got  to  be  an  absolute  match/'  pro 
nounced  Aunt  Het  decisively. 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS     131 

"Aunt  Het's  offered  to  loan  us  Oscar  for  a 
window  display,"  Floss  volunteered  after  a 
minute  inspection  of  the  paint  pots. 

"Only  for  two  hours  in  the  afternoon,"  the 
old  lady  qualified. 

"Only  two  hours  in  the  afternoon.  We'll 
have  a  dummy  parrot  sawed  out  of  a  board 
and  painted  to  match/'  Floss  rattled  on.  "Then 
Oscar  will  come  in  daily  and  ballyhoo  for  the 
Ink.  Isn't  it  splendid !" 

"Splendid!"  echoed  the  president  of  the 
Framm  Complexion  Company  Ink.  He  rubbed 
his  hands  in  delight.  Strange  how  the  thing 
was  getting  into  his  blood. 

"But  of  course,"  he  qualified,  "maybe  people 
will  ask  what  a  red-and-green  parrot  has  to  do 
with  Angel  Bloom." 

"Sush !"  cried  Floss.  "You  ought  to  see  our 
window  card — The  Parrot  lives  a  Hundred 
Years — Framm's  Compounds  Create  Lasting 
Beauty." 

"Let's  go  inside,"  suggested  Aunt  Het. 

A  crowd  was  beginning  to  gather,  mostly 
Chinese  idlers,  messenger  boys  and  truckmen 
— a  class  unconsidered  in  the  creation  of 
beauty  shops. 

The  interior  of  Framm's  was  quite  different 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


from  the  one  Chester  had  first  beheld  from 
the  door  of  a  fog-bound  hack.  The  floor  was 
carpeted  in  pink  and  the  wall  was  papered  in 
the  same  shade.  All  the  shelves,  cabinets  and 
show  cases  were  ivory  enameled.  The  Framm 
compounds  had,  in  the  few  months  past,  been 
complicated  into  Angel  Bloom  Salve,  Angel 
Bloom  Lotion,  Angel  Bloom  Elixir,  Framm's 
Magic  Hair  Gloss  and  the  Yard  of  Beauty 
Shelf,  the  last  including  all  the  Framm  prepa 
rations  with  a  celluloid  manicure  set  thrown 
in.  Which  was  in  the  nature  of  a  miracle; 
but  nothing  more  miraculous  than  this  unher 
alded  and  smiling  appearance  of  Aunt  Het 
upon  the  scene. 

"Well,"  smiled  that  mysterious  being,  seat 
ing  herself  upon  one  of  the  whirling  stools  in 
front  of  the  show  case,  "Flossie  tells  me  you're 
turning  out  to  be  quite  a  business  man." 

"He's  wonderful!"  chimed  in  Floss.  "I  al 
ways  told  you  he  would  be." 

"Thanks,"  responded  Chester,  flattered  in 
spite  of  his  better  nature.  Then  with  a  stroke 
of  boldness  he  had  undoubtedly  borrowed  from 
his  wife  he  asked:  "When  did  you  get  over 
being  cross  with  us,  Aunt  Het?" 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS     13S 

"I?  Cross?  When  was  I  ever  cross  with 
you  two  foolish  darlings?" 

"Something  told  me,  the  day  we  moved " 

Floss,  who  stood  behind  him,  pinched  his  ear 
quite  painfully.  "Floss  simply  insisted  on 
moving/'  went  on  the  old  lady.  "My  spirit 
guide  warned  me  against  the  insurance  busi 
ness  and  Mr.  Applethwaite  had  promised  to 
dismiss  you." 

"Oh."  Chester  heard  in  so  many  words 
what  he  had  suspected  this  long  time.  The 
discharge  and  the  eviction — and  possibly  the 
spirit  guide — coming  all  in  the  same  hour,  had 
been  one  of  those  Floss-arranged  melodramas. 

"And  just  look  what  it's  done  for  you !"  cried 
Aunt  Het.  "Now  you're  boss  of  your  own 
business  and  making  money  hand  over  fist." 

"Well,  yes." 

Chester  was  a  shade  less  enthusiastic  than 
he  had  been  a  minute  ago. 

"Aren't  you?" 

"I've  been  going  over  the  trade  in  Los 
Angeles,"  said  he.  "Flossie's  advertisements 
never  fail  to  draw  a  crowd,  but  all  the  big 
druggists  have  their  own  preparations.  The 
Mr.  Framm  Loves  a  Pretty  Girl  poster  created 
considerable  amusement.  I  got  some  orders — 


134  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

seven  cases  all  told.  But  as  far  as  I  can  make 
out  we're  retailers  trying  to  break  into  the 
wholesale.  The  shop  about  pays  for  itself,  but 
we  still  owe  for  part  of  the  fixtures.  Floss 
got  us  started  with  a  loan  on  her  street-railway 
stocks,  but  that's  about  gone  for  raw  ma 
terials " 

"Two  hundred  dollars  in  my  own  selfish 
stocking,"  Floss  corrected  him. 

"We  have  a  limited  credit  for  supplies  which 
we've  got  through  Holbetter;  but  Holbetter's 
the  smallest  druggist  in  America,  I  suppose. 
There's  the  matter  of  bottles  alone.  We're 
using  eleven  different  types  and  sizes  which 
we  have  to  buy  in  small  lots — the  most  ex 
pensive  way.  That's  where  we  stand.  We're 
looked  upon  as  a  set  of  patent-medicine  fakers 
and  a  sudden  expansion  would  blow  us  off  the 
map." 

"Doesn't  he  sum  it  up  won-derfully!"  cooed 
lovely  Floss,  clapping  her  hands.  "And  to 
think  when  I  found  him  he  was  nothing  but 
an  orator.  And  now  he  talks  like  the  president 
of  the  First  National  Bank." 

"There's  some  difference  between  us  and 
the  First  National  Bank,"  he  informed  her  with 
a  sad  smile. 


*?, 


"MR.  HORN,"  TACTFULLY  SUGGESTED  AUNT  HET,  "DON'T  YOU  THINK  WE 

HAD  BETTER  TRY  A  LITTLE  BLUE  IN  THE  RED OSCAfi's  WINGS 

AREN'T  AT  ALL  THE  SHADE  YOU'RE  USING" 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS     135 

"We're  a  lot  more  fun!"  chirped  Flossie. 
"Oh,  see  how  I  stenciled  rosebuds  on  all  the 
doors.  Aunt  Het,  are  you  going  to  lend  us 
Oscar  to-day?" 

"The  paint  might  make  him  ill,"  objected  the 
old  lady,  rising  with  her  sacrilegious  cage. 
"I'll  have  Wong  bring  him  round  with  his 
perch  to-morrow  afternoon." 

"Hor-rors!  Hor-raws!  Awk!  Awk!" 
screamed  Oscar  as  Aunt  Het,  defying  her  luck, 
passed  out  under  Mr.  Horn's  polychrome  lad 
der. 

"Why  didn't  you  tell  me  it  was  you  that  got 
Aunt  Het  and  Mr.  Applethwaite  to  throw  me 
out?"  he  accused  her  as  soon  as  Flossie's  ec 
centric  relative  had  taken  her  departure. 

"Old  Nuisance,"  she  replied,  "you  ought  to 
know  why.  It's  impossible  for  me  to  think  and 
talk  at  the  same  time.  And  you've  scarcely 
kissed  me  once  since  you  got  back." 

Dr.  Nathaniel  Hawthorne  Holbetter  walked 
in  upon  the  love  scene.  He  was  a  quaint  little 
person,  and  when  costumed  for  the  street  he 
wore  an  obsolete  derby  with  a  high  square 
crown  over  his  abundant  iron-gray  locks.  His 
veiny  right  hand  clasped  an  ebony  cane  with 
an  ivory  handle  carved  to  resemble  a  female 


136  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

leg  bent  at  the  knee.  He  affected  greenish 
broadcloth  and  a  huge  Masonic  watch  charm. 

"You  back,  Framm  ?"  he  asked  sharply,  mak 
ing  it  plain  that  it  was  Mrs.  Framm  who  had 
drawn  him  there.  His  question  trailed  off  into 
a  series  of  loud  clicks. 

"Just  this  minute,"  replied  Chester.  "How 
are  things  going?" 

"Rotten!"  He  clicked  once.  "Quite  rot 
ten  !"  He  clicked  twice. 

"That's  what  I  like  about  Buffalo  Willie!" 
exclaimed  Floss,  coming  over  and  stroking  his 
dangerous  chin  beard.  "He  sees  the  bright  side 
of  ev-erything.  Isn't  he  cute,  Goober  ?" 

Buffalo  Willie's  old  face  puckered  itself  into 
a  series  of  fond  little  wrinkles.  It  was  plain  to 
see  that  the  witchery  of  Floss  had  changed  him 
into  a  small  hairy  pet. 

"Yes.  Yes.  Yes-yes."  Buffalo  Willie 
emitted  a  long  series  of  clicks.  "But  we've 
got  to  come  down  to  tacks.  Tacks!" 

He  seated  himself  on  a  stool  and  as  he  talked 
he  pulled  fragments  of  dried  root  out  of  his 
pocket  and  chewed  savagely. 

"Tacks.  Things  have  to  go  forward  or 
back  in  this  world.  No  standstill.  That's  the 
trouble  with  the  Pharmacy.  Standstill.  Feet 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS     137 

in  the  mud  and  you  start  to  back  up.  Under 
stand?" 

"What's  that  drug  you're  always  eating, 
Willie  ?"  asked  Floss,  her  mind  as  usual  on  the 
concrete  rather  than  the  abstract. 

"Licorice.  Good  for  the  throat.  Have 
some?"  He  passed  a  fragment  over  to  her 
and  she  chewed  gingerly. 

"Now  these  preparations.  Overstocked,  un 
dersold.  Expensive  loft  rented  to  manufac 
ture.  Six  girls  employed  compounding  the  lo 
tions  and  creams."  Click-click.  "Too  many. 
I  laid  two  off  yesterday." 

"I  had  a  notion  we  were  undercapitalized," 
objected  Chester. 

"Wrong.  Overstocked.  These  new  prepar 
ations  all  very  well.  But  they're  scarcely  on 
the  market.  What  we've  got  to  do  is  to  sell 
more  Angel  Bloom  right  away  or "  Click- 
click.  That  seemed  to  settle  it  for  Angel 
Bloom. 

"How  much  have  we  on  hand?" 

"Angel  Bloom?  Twenty-six  hundred  bot 
tles.  Seemed  to  put  too  much  faith  in  the 
preparation.  How  many  orders  did  you  get  in 
Los  Angeles  ?" 


138  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

'Tor  Angel  Bloom?  Two  cases/'  Chester 
was  bound  to  admit. 

"That's  it.  Something  about  the  advertis 
ing.  Shouldn't  wonder  if  the  Magic  Hair 
Gloss  might  go  pretty  well."  The  hair  gloss 
was  Holbetter's  own  invention.  "But  no 
capital  for  that.  Everything  devoted  to  An 
gel  Bloom  Cream.  Not  selling  right.  Framm 
Complexion  ad  all  right.  That  sort  of  stuff 
has  to  percolate.  Percolate." 

"Of  course  we  can't  pay  our  debts  with 
stock  on  hand,"  agreed  the  president  of  the 
Ink. 

"Can't  be  done.  Now  the  fourteenth. 
Need  at  least  eight  hundred  dollars  before  the 
first.  Otherwise "  Click-click. 

"In  a  word  we're  required  to  get  rid  of 
twenty-six  hundred  bottles  of  Angel  Bloom 
Cream  in  two  weeks  if  we  expect  to  pull 
through,"  was  Chester's  excellent  summing 
of  the  case. 

"And  miracles  don't  happen.  Not  in  the 
drug  business." 

"You  poor  sweetheart!"  It  was  Floss  who 
came  into  the  conference.  "How  like  a  child 
you  do  talk!" 

"Mean  to  say?"  snapped  the  little  old  gen- 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS     139 

tleman.  "Twenty-six  hundred  bottles  of  pink 
lotion.  Couldn't  force  it  on  'em  in  two  weeks. 
Not  without  a  pump!" 

"We'll  get  the  pump,  Willie." 

"Maybe  we  can.     Maybe  so.     Maybe  so." 

"I'm  just  the  least  bit  bruised,"  she  insisted, 
"to  think  of  the  way  you've  gone  back  on  all 
the  nice  things  you  said  about  my  window  card 
with  pretty  me  in  the  center." 

"Some  people  like  it,"  Buffalo  Willie  ad 
mitted,  "but  it  sells  no  goods.  Only  yesterday 
dark  fellow  comes  along.  Stops  in  front  of 
the  pharmacy.  Dangerous  looking.  Danger 
ous.  Takes  off  hat,  rubs  head!"  Willie 
clicked  twice.  "Then  comes  rushing  into  store. 
Where  did  you  get  that  picture  ?'  Dangerous. 
Thought  he  was  going  to  throw  fit,  so  stood 
ready  with  aromatic  spirits.  'Friend  of  mine,' 
says  I.  'Unknown  lady  inventor.  Try  a  bot 
tle?'  Will  not,'  says  he;  'but  I'll  give  a  dol 
lar  for  the  poster.'  Last  one  I  had.  Refused. 
How's  that?" 

Chester  looked  at  Floss,  who  at  the  moment 
was  looking  at  Buffalo  Willie. 

"Wasn't  he  sweet!"  she  exclaimed. 

"Perhaps.  Women  have  peculiar  notions. 
Hated  this  fellow.  Spaniard.  When  I  re- 


140  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

fused  to  sell  he  almost  stole  the  Love  a  Peach 
poster  right  out  of  the  window.  Bad  lot.  Fi 
nally  said  'My  card!'  and  went  boiling  into 
the  street.  Get  some  queer  compounds  in  my 
business." 

"He  gave  you  his  card?"  asked  Floss  in  the 
gentlest  possible  tone. 

Buffalo  Willie  went  rummaging  through 
his  peculiar  clothes  and  fished  out  a  peculiar 
assortment  of  papers  mixed  with  shreds  of 
licorice  root.  At  last  he  blew  the  dust  from  a 
small  card  before  presenting  it  to  Mrs. 
Framm.  Her  face  was  a  study. 

"I  knew  he  would!"  she  murmured  eventu 
ally,  and  passed  the  card  to  her  husband,  who 
made  no  comment  as  he  read: 

MR.  RAMON  DE  SILVA 
Representing  the  San  Francisco  Blade 

As  soon  as  Chester  had  escorted  Doctor 
Holbetter  to  the  sidewalk  and  been  slyly 
informed  that  Mrs.  Framm  was  a  wonderful 
woman — watch  her — accomplish  anything — -. 
blow  something  up  some  time — Chester  re 
turned  to  the  interior  of  the  Angel  Bloom 
Shop  and  asked  of  his  amazing  consort: 


WILLIE  DESCENDING  TO  TACKS     141 

"What  are  you  going  to  do  about  this  Spig- 
goty?" 

"Do  about  him?    Why,  use  him,  of  course!" 

"Now  look  here,  Floss !  We  can't  have  our 
business  wrecked  any  more  than  it  is  by  hav 
ing  that  nuisance  round.  What's  he  doing  in 
San  Francisco?" 

"I  haven't  asked  him/'  she  replied  calmly. 
"But  I  suppose  he's  come  up  here  to  find  me." 

"Oh." 

"Isn't  it  providential?  Just  at  the  time  we 
need  him." 

"What  can  we  do  with  him?" 

"Use  him  in  the  Ink,  foolish." 

"In  what  capacity,  if  you  don't  mind  say 
ing?" 

"Press  agent." 

"Press  agent !  He  looks  about  as  much  like 
a  press  agent  as  I  look  like  a  hairdresser." 

"How  you  get  my  ideas!  Now  do  be  a 
dear  old  love-box  and  call  up  the  Blade  office 
and  ask  Spig  to  have  dinner  with  us  at  Mar- 
chand's.  Hurry,  Goob,  dear.  We've  got  to 
sell  oceans  of  Angel  Bloom  in  a  week,  and  we 
can't  leave  a  single  cobblestone  unturned  in 
San  Francisco." 


CHAPTER  IX 

SUSIE  THE  BULL 

AT  EIGHT-THIRTY  that  evening  the  cozy 
group  of  three  were  finishing  an  early  dinner 
at  Mar chancl's.  By  the  size  of  the  check, 
which  Chester  was  paying,  it  was  easy  to  in 
fer  that  Floss  had  many  important  things  on 
her  program  of  high-pressure  salesmanship. 

"So  the  whole  circus — tent's  canvasmen, 
menagerie  and  wagons — is  stranded  out  on  the 
sand  lots.  The  property  owners  won't  let 
them  exhibit,  the  mortgagees  have  seized  half 
their  rolling  stock,  and  you  can  hear  the  man 
ager  swearing  in  circus  language  the  whole 
length  of  Mission  Street." 

Thus  The  Spiggoty,  apparently  delighted 
with  his  unexpected  meeting,  finished  a  long 
story  of  the  broken-down  show  which  he  had 
reported  briefly  in  this  evening's  edition  of 
the  Blade.  A  changed  and  reduced  Spiggoty 
he  was  from  the  haughty  Hildago  of  Dyak. 
His  blue  suit  was  a  trifle  shiny,  his  manner 

142 


SUSIE  THE  BULL  143 

deferential  to  the  successful  rival;  but  there 
was  the  same  look  of  doglike  devotion  in  the 
somber  eyes  which  he  turned  toward  the  girl. 

"That's  the  very  circus  we  want !"  cried  she, 
dropping  her  hand  bag  and  permitting  The 
Spiggoty  to  stoop  for  it.  "Are  you  all  quite 
finished  ?  We've  got  time  to  get  out  there  be 
fore  they  put  the  boa  constrictor  in  his  um 
brella  case  or  whatever  they  do  with  the  poor 
old  dear  at  night." 

In  his  newly  accepted  situation  of  press 
agent  for  the  Ink,  Ramon  de  Silva  had  hinted 
at  possibilities.  Chester  dropped  his  napkin 
and  followed  Flossie's  mad  charge  out  intOi 
the  street.  His  not  to  question  why.  Floss 
had  decided  and  the  Company  Ink  had  but  to 
foot  the  bills.  In  the  car  bumping  out  toward 
circus  town  he  remained  the  silent  partner, 
viewing  with  alarm  his  wife's  evident  delight 
in  her  renewed  acquaintance  with  The  Spig 
goty.  Press  agent!  How  long  was  this  sur 
prising  arrangement  expected  to  last? 

At  the  end  of  the  line  an  acrid  smell  and 
weird  trumpeting  through  the  dusk  proclaimed 
the  circus.  It  turned  out  to  be  a  shabby  af 
fair  with  one  tent  still  standing  and  innumer- 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


able  gypsy  forms  grubbing  about  camp  fires 
or  swearing  at  work  horses. 

"Could  I  see  the  manager  or  floor  walker  or 
somebody  in  authority?"  asked  Floss  of  a 
seamy  individual  who  sat  on  a  pile  of  colored 
stakes  and  smoked  an  awful  cigar. 

"Ask  for  Hank,"  prompted  The  Spiggoty. 

"If  you  would  just  speak  to  Mr.  Hank," 
smiled  little  Mrs.  Framm. 

The  apparition  muttered  something  sound 
ing  like  "Ug"  and  strode  away. 

"Hank!"  The  name  seemed  to  have  af 
fected  the  dainty  inventor  of  perfumed  lotions 
as  she  stood  hedged  about  by  woeful  menag 
erie  smells.  "I  suppose  Hank  is  an  abbrevia 
tion  for  Handkerchief,  ain't  it?" 

"That's  the  man,"  said  Spig,  pointing 
through  the  dusk  and  indicating  a  roly-poly 
figure  as  it  emerged  from  a  tent  flap. 

He  came  up  looking  mean  and  hard  witK 
his  dyed  mustache  and  pink  shirt  front. 

"What's  wanted?"  he  growled,  giving  them 
the  evil  eye. 

"Oh,  this  is  Mr.  Hank?  I  came  out  to  see 
if  you  would  rent  me  one  of  the  animals  or  a 
cally-ope  maybe." 

"Huh.     I'm  glad  there's  somebody  in  this 


SUSIE  THE  BULL 145 

hick  town  that  wants  to  pay  for  something. 
I've  been  under  the  main  top  for  thirty  years 
and  I  never  trouped  out  against  such  a  bunch 
of  stiffs." 

"I  thought  you'd  like  San  Francisco,"  she 
agreed.  "Almost  everybody  does — at  once. 
Now  have  you  got  a  royal  Bengal  tiger  or  a 
marmoset  to  hire  by  the  day?" 

"Are  you  kiddin'  me,  girlie?"  asked  Mr. 
Hank;  but  he  looked  less  fierce,  as  people  were 
inclined  to  do  when  their  eyes  were  set  on 
Floss. 

"Not  the  least  little  particle.  What  have 
you  got  roaring  there  under  that  darling 
tent?" 

It  was  indeed  roaring,  even  at  that  moment. 

"Three  bulls  and  some  cats,"  volunteered 
the  proprietor. 

"Oh.     Then  that's  the  dairy  department!" 

"Elephants  and  lions,"  prompted  The  Spig- 
goty.  "That's  what  they  call  'em  in  the  show 
business." 

"It  must  be  dee-light f ul !"  she  cried.  "Liv 
ing  out  picnic  style  and  calling  everything  by 
irregular  names.  If  I  called  them  just  ele 
phants  would  you  understand  me?" 

"I  might,"  Mr.  Hank  permitted. 


146  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

''Well,  maybe  that's  what  I  want." 

"What  would  you  be  doing  with  an  ele 
phant?"  His  suspicious  manner  seemed  to  be 
returning. 

"You  see  we're  running  a  beauty  parlor." 

"Ho!  Ho!"  Mr.  Hank's  roars  rivaled  the 
trumpeting  of  his  captive  bulls.  "What  in  hell 
— excuse  me,  lady — do  you  want  with  an  ele 
phant  in  a  beauty  parlor?" 

"I  wouldn't  just  put  him  in  it,  you  know. 
And  I'd  promise  to  bring  him  back  at  supper- 
time  all  dusted  off — or  whatever  you  do  with 
elephants  after  dark." 

"H-m.  Well,  come  here  and  look,"  said  the 
manager. 

Under  the  flapping  tent,  shabbily  lit  by  lan 
terns,  three  swaying  mountains  of  flesh  could 
be  seen  indistinctly.  It  was  a  nightmare  pas 
sage  down  the  narrow  aisle,  shoulders  fairly 
brushing  dark  cages  in  whose  slatted  depths 
eyes  like  balls  of  fire  glared  out  while  the  pad- 
padding  of  feline  feet  could  be  heard  some 
where  too  close  for  safety. 

Right  behind  Chester's  broad  back  an  ap 
palling  roar  belched  through  the  gloomy  cav 
ern  and  almost  knocked  him  off  his  legs.  He 


SUSIE  THE  BULL 147 

leaped  several  feet.  Floss,  strange  woman 
that  she  was,  walked  serenely  on. 

"It's  just  the  lion,"  sang  out  the  manager. 
"He  won't  hurt  you." 

"You  heard  what  he  said,"  cooed  Floss  ever 
so  reassuringly.  She  groped  out  in  the  shad 
ows  and  gave  Chester  her  hand.  It  was  icy 
cold.  He  would  have  been  more  deeply 
touched  by  this,  no  doubt,  had  he  not  noted  in 
the  semidarkness  that  she  had  passed  her 
other  hand  to  The  Spiggoty. 

"This  way,  lady/'  suggested  Mr.  Hank,  and 
upon  the  word  he  disappeared  between  the  two 
high  gray  walls  which  upon  closer  inspection 
proved  to  be  the  sides  of  full-grown  elephants. 

"Riley!" 

"Hi-oo!"  The  jungle  call  responded  dis 
tantly  from  out  the  den  of  beasts. 

"Fetch  another  lantern." 

A  light  was  seen  weaving  under  elephantine 
legs,  and  Chester,  now  taking  the  lead,  fol 
lowed  between  the  living  walls,  Flossie  and 
her  press  agent  walking  gingerly  in  the  rear. 
Riley,  a  stubbled  tramp  in  a  plaid  cap,  held 
the  lantern  high  over  his  head,  giving  the  vis 
itors  from  another  world  a  full  view  of  Mr. 
Hank's  monsters.  Three  broad  sunken  fore- 


148  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^~~~mm'^~^^^m~~mm~~^^~?lm*^^^^'m*l''l>^^m'*^m'l*m 

heads  lowered  over  them,  three  sets  of  stumpy 
yellowish  tusks  seemed  pointing  straight  at 
their  unprotected  breasts  while  three  pairs  of 
bilious  wicked  eyes  rolled  terribly  in  the  sud 
den  glare.  Chester,  who  had  heard  of  ele 
phants  crowding  forward  and  crushing  their 
victims  with  their  foreheads,  noticed  the  great 
log  chains  which  held  their  rear  legs  to  stakes. 
This  reassured  him.  He  hoped  that  Flossie 
wouldn't  be  scared.  She  was  as  pale  as  death, 
but  her  eyes  were  dancing. 

'They  come  rather  large,  don't  they?"  she 
criticized. 

"Them  two,"  said  the  manager,  indicating 
two  foreheads  looming  over  them,  "are  nine- 
foot  bulls — Caesar  and  Brutus.  But  this  one 
here" — he  took  the  lantern  from  Riley  and 
led  the  way  a  few  paces  along  the  canvas — 
"she's  a  runt." 

"What  a  pity  she  never  grew  up,"  sympa 
thized  little  Mrs.  Framm.  "She  isn't  over 
seven  feet  tall." 

"Seven-foot-five  at  the  shoulders,"  the  nat 
uralist  corrected.  "She  had  a  shock  when  she 
was  a  baby.  Her  name's  Susie  and  she's 
smart  as  a  whip  for  all  that." 

"Poor  thing !"  said  Floss.    "I  suppose  you'd 


SUSIE  THE  BULL  149 

rent  her  cheap  on  account  of  her  withered  con 
dition?" 

"Whaddaya  call  cheap  ?"  asked  the  man 
ager. 

"How  do  they  come — by  the  pound?  You 
affectionate  darling!" 

Floss  addressed  this  last  compliment  to 
Susie,  who  had  slyly  reached  out  her  snakelike 
nose  and  was  smelling  the  decorations  on  the 
lady's  hat.  Mr.  Hank  upraised  the  short 
stick  he  was  carrying  and  using  it  like  a  base 
ball  bat  smote  Susie  resoundingly  across  the 
trunk.  Slowly,  deliberately  she  rolled  up  her 
inquisitive  end. 

"She's  a  nervous  wreck,  isn't  she!"  cried 
Floss.  "I'd  want  her  for  one  day,  maybe  two 
j — with  her  nurse,  of  course." 

"What  for?"  insisted  Mr.  Hank,  who,  as  he 
had  just  proved,  was  a  man  of  decision. 

"Take  me  out  into  the  air !" 

Not  only  was  she  pallid  now  but  her  eyes 
had  ceased  to  dance. 

Without  a  moment's  hesitation  Chester, 
evading  The  Spiggoty's  proffered  attention, 
lifted  her  in  his  arms  and  half  carried  her 
through  the  unknown  horrors  until  again  they 
breathed  the  sweet  winds  under  the  stars. 


150  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Get  her  a  drink!"  commanded  the  indig 
nant  husband. 

"Sure,"  Mr.  Hank  obliged  with  a  half- 
filled  flask  which  he  drew  from  his  hip  pocket. 
Chester  had  meant  a  drink  of  water,  but  Floss 
wet  her  lips  from  the  bottle  and  smiled  again. 

The  four  of  them  sat  down  upon  a  pile  of 
crates  within  reflecting  distance  of  the  bivouac 
fire  round  which  a  dozen  rough  characters 
grumbled  together  and  drank  something  out 
of  a  tin  bucket. 

"Now  this  is  what.  Buffalo  Willie  calls 
tacks/'  Floss  went  into  the  subject  with  re 
newed  vigor.  "I've  positively  decided  to  have 
an  elephant.  Or  have  you  any  kangaroos  in 
stock?" 

-"Four,"  admitted  Mr.  Hank. 

"Kangaroos  are  so  restless,"  she  solilo 
quized.  "It  needs  a  boomerang  to  make  them 
behave.  I  don't  suppose  you  keep  boomer 
angs,  Mr.  Hank?" 

Mr.  Hank  admitted  that  they  were  just  out 
of  boomerangs,  but  urged :  "Susie's  got 
brains.  What  do  you  want  with  her  in  the 
complexion  business  ?  When  it  comes  to  com 
plexions  I'd  say  there  was  some  that's  got  it 
on  her — you,  for  instance.  What's  the  idea?" 


SUSIE  THE  BULL  151 

"It's  lovely  the  way  you  appreciate  things !" 
she  cried,  offering  Mr.  Hank  one  of  her  best 
smiles,  which  immediately  turned  his  natur 
ally  repulsive  features  into  a  symphony  of 
delight  Then  she  turned  a  rapidly  signaling 
glance  to  her  companions.  "You  don't  know 
the  least  thing  about  natural  history,  Goob," 
she  hinted.  "But  Spig's  my  press  agent." 

Having  learned  diplomacy  with  life's  rapid 
advance  Chester  left  them  alone  on  the  pile 
of  colored  poles  and  went  to  the  other  side  of 
the  bivouac  fire,  where  men  in  a  strange  argot 
were  discussing  Full  House  Marie  and  the 
passion  for  a  copper-roofed  kinker  which  had 
caused  her  desertion  from  the  main  top.  A 
half  hour  of  this  veiled  scandal  satisfied  Ches 
ter  A.  Framm,  who  sought  out  the  bright- 
hued  lumber  pile  to  face  his  wife  and  The 
Spiggoty  in  conference  with  Mr.  Hank. 

"Waterproof?"  Mr.  Hank  was  anxiously  in 
quiring. 

"No.  That's  the  weak  point.  If  it  should 
rain  we'd  have  to  change  to  a  Bengal  tiger  or 
something  permanent.  But  I  think  the  weath 
er's  settled.  Won't  you  be  friends  with  us, 
Mr.  Hank?" 

There  fell  a  space  of  contemplation  during 


152  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

which  the  manager  chewed  a  shapeless  cigar 
under  his  villainous  mustachios.  What  he 
could  do  with  a  little  ready  money  was  un 
doubtedly  uppermost  in  his  mind. 

-'Keeper  would  have  to  go  along/'  he  mum 
bled  at  last.  'That  would  come  to  some  extra 
expense." 

"Oh,  the  keeper  of  course !"  she  agreed  witK 
all  her  native  enthusiasm.  "And  haven't  you 
got  an  awfully  funny  one?" 

"There's  Riley,"  he  conceded.  *'He  used  to 
lie  a  clown — an  August  with  an  act  on  the 
slack  wire. 

"He  cracked  one  of  his  vertebrals  and  he's 
been  bull  boss  ever  since.  He's  got  a  white- 
face  English-dude  make-up  that's  a  scream." 

:"Per-fect!"  she  cooed.  "Chester,  think  of 
it!  Isn't  he  a  sweetheart?" 

Even  in  an  excess  of  enthusiasm  Chester 
could  not  characterize  Mr.  Hank  as  a  sweet 
heart. 

"And  of  course  you'll  throw  in  Riley,"  she 
coaxed  almost  lovinglly. 

"I  will  not!"  This  was  certain.  "He'll  be 
twenty-five  extra." 

"How  horrid  of  you!  And  how  much  will 
Susie  the  bull  come  to?" 


SUSIE  THE  BULL  153 

"A  hundred  dollars  a  day  will  be  about 
right."  He  said  it  savagely,  hinting  an  attack 
by  canvasmen  unless  his  terms  were  agree 
able. 

"That  will  be  satisfactory,"  she  said  with 
unusual  hauteur. 

"Flossie !"  gasped  her  husband,  little  know 
ing  where  the  hundred  and  twenty-five  dollars 
would  come  from  for  this  folly. 

"When  does  Susie  usually  get  up  in  the 
morning?"  she  was  asking  smoothly  of  the 
manager. 

"We  won't  quarrel  about  that,"  he  grum 
bled. 

"Well,  then,  Doctor  Holbetter,  my  chemist, 
will  be  round  at  eight  with  Mr.  de  Silva,  my 
publicity  manager.  And  I'll  be  here  at  nine, 
say,  if  Susie  doesn't  mind." 

"I've  been  follerin'  the  red  wagon  a  long 
time,"  boasted  Mr.  Hank  when  they  shook 
hands  on  the  transaction,  "but  this  is  a  new 
act  on  me." 

"It's  hardly  anything  to  what  I  can  think  up 
when  I  really  try,"  she  modestly  informed 
him,  and  led  her  retinue  toward  the  trolley. 

"Let's  get  off  at  a  drug  store,"  said  Floss 
almost  as  soon  as  they  had  got  on. 


154  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Preparations  for  Susie?"  asked  Chester 
now  too  feeble  for  argument. 

"Sort  of.  I  want  to  telephone  Buffalo  Wil 
lie — the  poor  dear  will  be  up  all  night,  I  sup 
pose.  And  then  we  must  get  Mr.  Horn  to  do 
the  sign," 


CHAPTER  X 

[WHAT  ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  COULD  DO 

SAN  FRANCISCO  was  always  cosmopolitan, 
but  it  was  never  sufficiently  so  to  remain  indif 
ferent  to  what  it  saw  that  balmy  morning  in 
mid-September  when,  at  the  hour  of  eleven,  a 
new  and  startling  version  of  the  Floss  Idea 
conducted  its  solemn  comic  march  up  through 
the  Mission  and  into  the  very  trade  centers  of 
the  town. 

'It's  pink!" 

The  first  small  boy  who  was  aware  of  Susie 
far  out  in  the  suburbs  started  the  watchword, 
which  was  cried  all  over  town  ere  the  fatal 
hour  of  noon. 

"It's  pink !" 

Innocent  bystanders  rubbed  their  innocent 
eyes  and  passed  the  remark  on  to  astonished! 
neighbors  who  repeated  it,  the  phrase  running 
from  lip  to  lip,  none  so  disputatious  as  to  deny 
that  obvious  and  colorful  truth. 

Pink  was  Susie,  even  unto  the  uttermost 
155 


156  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

ends  of  her  anatomy.  Buffalo  Willie  had 
mixed  the  compound  which  so  smoothly  cov 
ered  her  vast  bulk,  but  it  was  Flossie  who  had 
added  the  coloring  matter,  a  brilliant  shade  of 
rose  blushing  through  a  field  of  snowy  white. 
Susie's  trunk  resembled  nothing  so  much  as  a 
yard  and  three-quarters  of  pink  rubber  hose. 
Floss  had  added  to  the  effect  by  touching  the 
old  darling's  cheek  bones  with  bright  spots  of 
red  and,  by  way  of  contrast,  whitening  the 
sunken  forehead.  There  was  something  al 
most  indecent  about  so  many  square  feet  of 
pinkness  marching  undraped  before  the  public 
stare.  But  it  was  necessary  for  the  appartion, 
led  by  its  capering  clown-dude,  to  swing  with 
in  reading  distance  before  the  full  significance 
was  comprehended. 

Susie  wore  but  a  single  garment,  a  snow- 
white  blanket  thing,  lettered  with  large 
blotches  of  black: 

ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM 

DID  THIS  FOR  MY  COMPLEXION. 

IT  WILL  Do  THE  SAME  FOR  YOURS. 

The  pink  elephant  and  her  attendant  clown, 
equally  lacking  in  a  sense  of  humor,  continued 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  157i 

^**^"**""^^^^''^^^^^^^™^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^™^^^™^^^^^^^™^^^^^^^'^^^^^j 

their  stately  march  through  town.  The  crowd 
thickened.  Shopmen  left  their  shops  unat 
tended,  butchers'  boys  dropped  their  baskets 
and  ran  after  the  prodigy,  street  cars  halted 
as  though  stricken  with  the  sight.  Once  or 
twice  representatives  of  San  Francisco's  more 
or  less  modern  police  force  were  seen  to  charge 
the  multitude  in  order  to  make  make  way  for 
the  royal  progress. 

"We'll  all  be  arrested  within  the  next 
block/'  muttered  Chester  to  his  Floss  as  they 
were  following  anxiously  in  the  outskirts  of 
the  crowd. 

"Nope,"  responded  little  Mrs.  Framm  de 
cisively.  "Spig  got  the  mayor's  license  to 
march,  parade  and  exhibit  from  eleven  till 
four." 

For  the  first  time  he  noted  the  fluttering 
paper  within  her  hand,  which,  by  the  way, 
trembled  somewhat. 

"And  then  he  deserted  us,  I  suppose," 
growled  the  much-enduring  Chester. 

"Spig?  No — he'll  never  desert  us.  He's 
off  somewhere  stirring  up  the  newspapers." 

The  pink  elephant  had  now  stopped  in  the 
midst  of  a  circumambient  crush.  The  great 
rosy  mountain,  rising  above  the  throng,  gave 


158  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

the  effect  of  some  gigantic  piece  of  confec 
tionery  surrounded  by  hungry  ants.  Never 
in  the  world's  history  had  anything  animate 
been  so  pink  and  huge.  Susie  had  got 
jammed  in  and  the  police  were  clearing  the 
way. 

The  Framms,  wedged  in  behind  two  elderly, 
respectable  colored  persons,  gained  fragments 
of  useful  criticism. 

"Hit's  contrariwise  to  de  law  of  Gawd," 
the  black  man,  whose  appearance  was  clerical, 
was  explaining  to  his  wife.  "De  Good  Book 
say  dat  de  beasts  ob  de  woods  an'  de  fowls 
ob  de  air  shall  not  suffah  beautifaction  from 
de  hand  ob  man " 

"Laws,  honey!"  giggled  his  consort,  "ef  I 
cud  find  a  cold  cream  make  me  pale  rossberry 
cullud  laik  dat  elephum — yes,  ma'am!" 

Chester  looked  nervously  round.  It  was 
just  as  he  feared.  Floss  had  another  idea. 

"Goob,"  she  shrilled  in  his  ear,  "run  over 
to  the  store  and  bring  a  dozen  bottles  of 
Bloom."  Aunt  Het  was  tending  the  place 
that  morning. 

-"What  for?"  he  parleyed. 

"Oh,  please!"  she  urged;  and  he  could  see 
by  her  expression  that  she  was  going  to  cry 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  159 

if  he  didn't.  "Bring  'em  round  to  the  corner 
of  Kearney  and  Market.  I'll  stop  the  parade 
there  and " 

"What  for?"  he  persisted  in  his  utterly  un 
reasonable  way. 

"Can't  you  see?"  she  hissed. 

He  who  would  have  been  on  the  way  to  a 
dignified  public  career  by  now  had  he  mar 
ried  Carlotta  Beam  turned  grumblingly  and 
obeyed.  Strange,  he  reflected,  how  people 
obeyed  Flossie — men  especially.  Something 
akin  to  disgust  filled  him  and  urged  him  to 
disloyalty  as  he  shuffled  along  toward  the 
frivolous  little  shop  on  Eddy  street.  A  dread 
ful  fear  possesed  him.  Was  Floss  conspiring 
that  he,  the  prize-winning  orator  of  Dyak 
University,  should  stand  at  a  street  corner 
shouting  the  virtues  of  a  cosmetic  swindle  to 
the  gaping  town? 

Then  the  picture  of  the  fragile  being  whom 
he  loved  more  than  fame  or  reputation  bat 
tling  alone  in  the  mob  with  her  atrocious  idea 
got  possession  of  him.  He  couldn't  help  it 
now,  Floss  must  have  her  way.  He  fairly 
ran  toward  the  green-and-red  front  on  Eddy 
Street,  and  once  there,  quite  disdaining  the 
astonished  cries  of  Aunt  Het  and  her  parrot, 


160  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

he  snatched  a  dozen  bottles  from  the  shelves, 
poked  them  recklessly  into  pockets  and  under 
elbows,  and  galloped  back  toward  Floss's 
latest  scene  of  disturbance.  The  nearer  he 
got  to  Kearney  and  Market  Streets  the  more 
clearly  he  saw  that  Floss  was  about  to  com 
mit  one  of  the  brilliant  desperate  errors  of 
genius.  The  prospect  so  appalled  him  that 
once  or  twice  he  was  near  to  dashing  the  bot 
tles  to  the  curb,  an  act  of  mutiny. 

But  the  charm  of  his  little  commander  bore 
him  swiftly,  steadily  on.  Aunt  Het  in  one 
of  her  moments  of  candor  had  said  that  Floss 
was  playing  a  system.  The  key  to  that  sys 
tem  was  simply  this:  When  in  doubt  attack 
the  most  unpromising  field.  She  had  married 
him  out  of  Dyak  upon  this  principle;  she  had 
got  him  a  job  in  the  office  of  her  rejected 
lover;  she  had  arranged  his  eviction  from 
Aunt  Het's  apartment;  she  had  hired  an  ele 
phant  and  painted  it  in  the  colors  of  beauty — 
all  a  part  of  her  system.  But  Chester  had 
come  to  his  limit  of  endurance. 

By  the  condition  of  Market  and  Kearney 
Streets  it  was  plain  to  see  that  the  peach-col 
ored  Susie  had  stopped  according  to  schedule. 
Boys  were  climbing  telephone  poles,  people 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  161 

were  scrambling  to  the  roofs  of  trolley  cars. 
The  noise  surged  to  a  shout,  then  resurged 
into  laughter.  Chester,  laden  with  those 
damnable  bottles,  fought  his  way  forward, 
but  the  going  was  ever  more  difficult  with 
each  shoulder  thrust.  The  crowd  grew  sud 
denly  still  with  the  silence  of  marvel.  Gazing 
nervously  toward  the  pink  elephant  Chester 
realized  the  cause  of  this  frozen  attention. 
Susie  was  being  put  through  her  tricks. 

Slowly,  ponderously,  like  a  giant  done  in 
charlotte  russe  the  pink  elephant  got  up  on  her 
hind  legs  and  raised  her  roseate  trunk  toward 
the  midday  sun. 

"Salute  the  ladies  and  gentlemen!"  shouted 
the  white-faced  comedian  with  the  dudish 
dress  suit  and  the  exaggerated  monocle. 

Susie  spread  her  forelegs  above  her  pink 
belly  and  uttered  a  trumpet  call  which  sounded 
from  Telegraph  Hill  to  the  Cliff  House. 

Chester,  who  had  managed  to  squeeze  him 
self  to  the  front  ranks,  was  relieved  by  one 
thing.  Floss  was  nowhere  to  be  seen. 

"By  gosh,  it  is  pink!"  some  brilliant  natural 
ist  discovered  quite  out  loud. 

"Pink — pink — pink!"  The  very  heavens 
seemed  to  echo  the  cry. 


162  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Where  and  how  was  this  all  going  to  end? 

Chester  A.  Framm,  who  should  have  been 
inured  to  marvels  by  this  time,  found  out  soon 
enough,  The  picture  was  forever  to  last  in 
his  memory — all  San  Francisco  circling  round 
a  small  open  space ;  the  pink  elephant  standing 
full  length,  like  some  nightmare  caryatid;  a 
small  Semitic  citizen  somewhere  in  the  back 
ground  struggling  with  a  pushcart  load  of 
assorted  fruits  and  vegetables. 

"Ay-hoo!"  bellowed  the  clown  dude,  and 
blushing  Susie  began  to  get  down.  She  came 
down  in  sections,  as  performing  elephants  pre 
fer  to  do.  First  she  gave  way  cautiously  at 
the  knees,  then  she  descended  to  a  Gargan 
tuan  squat,  then  she  curled  her  pink  trunk  and 
brought  her  forefeet  with  a  thud  to  the  as 
phalt.  The  last  phase  of  the  maneuver  con 
sisted  in  raising  her  hind  quarters  and  stand 
ing  in  the  normal  elephantine  position,  sway 
ing  from  side  to  side. 

San  Francisco  began  to  shout — a  shout 
which  was  interrupted  by  Susie,  who  did,  un 
der  the  circumstances,  the  unkindest  thing 
within  her  power.  She  uttered  one  heart 
breaking  shriek,  swayed  seasickly  to  one  side 
and  fell  all  of  a  heap.  Great  was  the  fall 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM 163 

thereof.  In  the  impact  of  that  avalanche  the 
fruit-bearing  pushcart  was  struck,  and  a  col 
orful  geyser  of  oranges,  bananas,  pineapples 
and  lemons  went  spouting  to  the  zenith.  A 
pallid  little  huckster  crawled  out  from  under 
something  and  his  crazy  gesticulations  were 
lost  in  the  crowd. 

"I  knew  it !"  cried  Chester  A.  Framm,  drop 
ping  a  half  dozen  bottles  to  wring  his  agonized 
hands.  "That  damned  paint  has  killed  her." 

Numerous  San  Franciscans  surging  for 
ward  hemmed  him  in,  but  not  too  closely  for 
his  eyesight  to  confirm  his  worst  fears.  Susie 
was  lying  flat  on  her  side,  like  some  curiously 
tinted  leviathan,  stranded  and  lifeless.  The 
clown  dude  had  knelt  down  and,  it  appeared, 
was  gazing  anxiously  into  her  open  mouth. 

"Dead." 

Chester  heard  some  disinterested  sympa 
thizer  pronounce  this  like  the  tolling  of  a 
cracked  bell. 

Inside  the  circle  a  policeman  had  appeared 
and  was  pushing  back  the  throng  with  the 
spoken  ritual  which  policemen  have  employed 
under  such  circumstances  since  the  days  of 
Pharaoh: 

"Stand  back  there!    Give  'em  air!" 


164  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

They  stood  back  and  gave  'em  air  so 
promptly  that  Chester  found  himself  deserted 
by  the  ebbing  humanity,  almost  alone  in  the 
front  ranks.  The  clown  dude  had  settled  him 
self  despondently  upon  Susie's  shoulder  and 
was  regarding  her  outstretched  trunk  with  a 
moody  gaze.  What  should  Chester  do?  As 
the  temporary  employer  of  the  wrecked  pink 
elephant  what  was  his  status  before  the  pub 
lic? 

The  question  was  decided  for  him  in  a  jiffy, 
for  an  imposing  female  figure  had  swept  for 
ward  out  of  the  throng  and  stood  accusingly 
before  the  clown  dude. 

"Who  is  the  owner  of  this  animal?"  she  was 
asking  in  a  deep-throated  distinct  tone  which 
held  a  familiar  ring  for  Chester's  ears. 

"None  of  your  business,  lady,"  was  Riley's 
diplomatic  answer,  which  threw  the  crowd 
into  transports  of  joy. 

"That's  exactly  what  it  happens  to  be,"  she 
pointed  out  in  her  cultivated  voice.  "I  am  a 
representative  of  the  Humane  Society." 

Riley  got  down  from  Susie's  shoulder. 

"Ain't  nobody  been  crool  to  no  animal, 
lady,"  he  protested,  his  chalk-white  clown's 
face  doubly  tragic  in  its  earnestness. 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM       165 

"It's  plain  to  see  that  you  have  killed  the 
elephant/'  she  lectured,  "by  stopping  its  pores 
with  a  coat  of  house  paint." 

"Before  Gawd,  lady " 

"Are  you  responsible  for  this  animal?" 

"No'm.     I'm  only  the  stiff  that " 

"Who  is  responsible  for  him?" 

"That  guy  over  there." 

The  clown  dude  pointed  straight  at  the  spot 
where  Chester  was  standing  exposed  to  view. 
The  tall  lady  turned  and  gave  him  the  full  ben 
efit  of  her  scornful  eyes. 

Chester  withered.     It  was  Carlotta  Beam! 

"I'm  responsible  for  him — her,"  he  boldly 
informed  this  new  complication,  for  it  was 
evident  that  there  was  no  escape  now. 

"Ches "  she  started  to  say,  then  bit  her 

classic  underlip.  She  was  really  very  beauti 
ful  as  she  stood  there;  an  untidy,  Slavic  sort 
of  beauty.  A  strand  of  her  raven-black  hair 
had  come  undone  and  her  dark  eyes  burned 
with  astonishment,  rebuke,  indignation. 

"I  didn't  know,  Mr.  Framm,"  she  began 
coldly,  "that  you  were  engaged  in  the  circus 
business," 

Facing  the  woman  who  in  a  desperate  meet 
ing  had  informed  him  that  his  feet  were  stray- 


166  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

ing  in  the  primrose  paths  he  was  loath  to  tell 
her  in  so  many  words  that  he  was  not  a  circus 
man  but  the  proprietor  of  a  patent  skin  lotion, 
two  samples  of  which  were  now  protruding 
from  his  pockets. 

"It  was  entirely  an  accident,  Miss  Beam/' 
he  replied  as  levelly  as  he  could.  "We  merely 
hired  this  elephant  by  the  day.  She  is  not 
painted  with  house  paint;  she  is  colored  by  a 
perfectly  harmless  substance.  Oh,  search 
me!"  He  was  losing  patience  with  himself 
and  Carlotta  and  the  gaping  multitude. 

"Lady/5  cut  in  the  policeman,  standing  of 
ficiously  between,  "if  you're  going  to  prefer 
charges,  you'd  better  do  it  now/' 

Carlotta  stood  a  little  moment,  her  deep 
tragic  gaze  fixed  upon  the  man  who  had  fallen 
so  low. 

"I — don't  want  to  make  any  charges,"  she 
said  generously.  "If  I've  made  any — I — I 
withdraw  them." 

Chester  was  about  to  stammer  his  thanks. 

"No  you  don't!" 

It  was  undoubtedly  Flossie's  voice,  but  how 
It  got  there  and  what  had  lent  it  that  fighting 
note  was  beyond  Chester's  dizzy  comprehen 
sion.  Yet  there  stood  Floss  beside  the  police- 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM      167 

man,  the  gold  of  her  eyes  spitting  fire,  her 
fashionable  little  figure  drawn  taut  as  she 
faced  her  old  rival  of  Dyak  days. 

"Oh,  Mrs.  Framm!" 

Carlotta  looked  positively  foolish.  Flossie 
had  taken  the  wind  out  of  her  sail  as  she  had 
done  so  many  times  of  yore. 

"I  heard  you  say  before  all  these  people  that 
you  represented  the  Humane  Thingumajig," 
declared  Mrs.  Framm  in  a  voice  which  pene 
trated  to  the  outermost  edges  of  the  throng. 

"Humane  Society,"  responded  Miss  Beam, 
straightening  against  the  blow. 

"Well,  then — we've  hired  an  elephant  for 
advertising  purposes.  You've  seen  it  drop 
dead  because  of  our  terrible  horrid  con 
temptible  mean  treatment.  And  you  want  to 
arrest  us." 

"I  was  just  saying  to  Ches — to  Mr.  Framm 
— that  I  wish  to  withdraw  the  charge." 

"What  do  you  want  to  withdraw  the  charge 
for?"  Flossie  shot  the  question  as  straight 
as  an  arrow,  "Are  you  afraid  to  appear  in 
court  against  us?  Afraid  that  you  can't 
prove  you're  a  member  of  the  Society  for  the 
Prevention  of  Things?" 

"Hush  I"  whispered  Chester. 


168  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


"I  won't  hush !"  replied  Flossie.  "Carlotta 
Beam,  what  are  you  afraid  of?" 

"I  am  not  aware "  she  began. 

"O  Lord!"  groaned  the  little  persecutor. 
"Here's  somebody  else  who's  not  aware." 

But  Carlotta  wasn't  to  be  interrupted  in  her 
rhetorical  flow. 

"I  am  not  aware  that  I  expressed  fear,  Mrs. 
Framm.  And  if  it  is  your  wish  that  this  ob 
vious  case  of  cruelty  shall  be  prosecuted  in 
the  public  courts,  then  I  reverse  my  intentions. 
It  is  plain  to  be  seen  that  this  unfortunate 
beast  has  been  smeared  with  a  preparation 
that  has  done  him  bodily  harm." 

"About  six  bottles  of  that  preparation 
wouldn't  do  you  bodily  harm,"  mocked  Flossie. 
Which  was  unworthy  even  of  her. 

"Officer/'  spoke  Carlotta  in  measured  tones, 
"I  demand  that  these  people  be  arrested" 

The  officer,  who  proved  to  be  a  seraph 
named  Doody,  turned  a  broad  face,  first  to 
Carlotta,  then  to  Floss.  Already  it  was  easy 
to  see  whom  he  preferred. 

"What  the  devil  did  you  do  that  for?" 
groaned  Chester  of  the  flushed  and  lovely  lit 
tle  criminal  at  his  side. 

"Shut  up!"  was  all  she  said. 


ANGEL  BLOOM  CREAM  169 

And  these  were  the  bitterest  words  that  had 
thus  far  passed  between  them. 

"It's  a  shame,  lady."  The  look  which  Offi 
cer  Doody  gave  Mrs.  Framm  was  more  sym 
pathetic  than  the  law  required.  "If  it  wasn't 

in  the  line  of  earnin'  me  daily  bread " 

And  he  gave  her  a  melting  eye. 

"That's  the  only  thing  that  saves  you/' 
trilled  Floss,  returning  an  eye  for  an  eye. 

Two  policemen  escorted  them  to  the  patrol 
box  and  stood  guard  over  the  new-found 
treasures.  Several  other  policemen  passed 
through  the  throng  collecting  evidence.  As 
the  Black  Maria  came  clanging  round  a  cor 
ner,  slowed  down  and  backed  up  to  accom 
modate  the  Framms,  something  like  a  dense 
pink  cloud  was  seen  by  Chester  to  rise  up 
ward  and  upward  above  the  populace.  It  was 
a  pink  cloud  that  swayed  from  side  to  side; 
a  pink  cloud  from  which  yards  of  pink  rub 
ber  tubing  writhed  back  and  forth,  soliciting 
for  peanuts. 

Susie  had  come  to. 


CHAPTER  XI 
THE  PINK  VERDICT 

MAGISTRATE  MICHAEL  HENRY  HARORAN, 
before  whom  the  case  was  tried  in  the  morn 
ing,  had  at  about  this  point  in  his  career  so 
fixed  himself  in  the  heart  of  California  that 
he  was  already  being  mentioned  for  promo 
tion  to  the  State  Supreme  Court  and  from 
there  to  higher  honors.  The  Framms,  having 
been  released  on  Aunt  Het's  bail,  sat  in  the 
midst  of  the  Municipal  Building's  combined 
smells,  which  ranged  from  the  morgue  down 
stairs  to  the  detention  room  at  the  right  of 
the  throne  where  Judge  Haroran  was  meting 
out  justice. 

"Did  you  see  the  gang  out  in  the  street?" 
whispered  Floss  to  the  discouraged  man  be 
side  her.  "They're  packed  half  across  Ports 
mouth  Square.  People  who  can't  get  in  have 
stuck  round  to  get  a  look  at  Susie  and-— — " 

"Sh-h-h!"  he  cautioned  her,  because  the 
great  Haroran — who  had  a  seamy  face 

170 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  171 

L^^*^^^^>T^^T^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^  .,    . 

adorned  by  two  reddish  eyebrows,  which  as 
he  talked  seemed  to  be  pursuing  each  other 
like  two  blind  mice  across  his  forehead — was 
then  advising  one  Ah  Wok  never  again  to 
employ  a  hatchet  in  the  winning  of  his  own 
true  love.  The  Haroran  method  was  rapid, 
for  he  had  scarce  consigned  the  yellow  man 
to  a  month  of  laborious  peace  when  he  began 
to  lecture  a  maimed  longshoreman  upon  the 
ethics  of  handling  loose  paving  stones. 

"Isn't  it  marvelous!  Everybody's  waiting 
for  us!"  whispered  Floss  delightedly;  which 
caused  Chester  to  glare  round  the  crowded 
room  and  decide  that  what  she  said  was  true. 

The  benches  were  crowded  with  spectators 
and  the  social  standing  of  the  audience  was 
high — a  small  minority  of  listless  hangers-on, 
opium  addicts,  women  of  the  quarter;  a  large 
majority  of  well-dressed  citizens  and  ladies  of 
quality.  A  flood  of  sprightly  newspaper  com 
ment  had  roused  San  Francisco's  easily 
tempted  gala  spirit  and  was  lending  a  fash 
ionable  air  to  the  police  court's  squalor. 

Every  eye,  so  it  seemed,  was  on  the 
Framms,  and  even  Judge  Haroran,  perform 
ing  acrobatics  with  his  mouselike  eyebrows, 


172  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

appeared  to  be  awaiting  the  dramatic  titbit 
of  the  day. 

"Phew!"  Floss  exhaled  feelingly.  '"It 
smells  so  in  here  that  I  don't  blame  the  ele 
phant  for  staying  outside.  Hello!  There's 
Buffalo  Willie  with  the  clown  dude  and  the 
heart  specialist." 

Holbetter  and  Susie's  keeper  were  seen  hud 
dled  against  the  door,  closely  associating  with 
a  peppery,  square-built  gentleman  whose  eco 
nomical  gray  mustache  indicated  a  conserva 
tive  cast  of  thought. 

"Doctor  Hilcross!"  muttered  Chester,  rec 
ognizing  California's  most  fashionable  physi 
cian. 

"Yeah.  He's  a  crosspatch.  Took  me  ever 
so  long  to  convince  him.  But  I  cried — and 
here  he  is." 

Another  familiar  face  could  be  seen  com 
ing  down  the  aisle.  It  had  a  dimple  in  its 
chin  and  a  deeper  one  in  its  rosy  left  cheek. 
Sparkling  Irish  eyes  sought  out  Mrs.  Framm 
as  Officer  Doody,  the  susceptible  policeman 
who  had  made  the  arrest,  stopped  and  leaned 
over  in  an  attitude  of  fatherly  solicitude. 

"A  fine  crowd  ye've  drawn,  Mrs.  Framm. 
I've  seen  man-ny  a  society  murther  case  has 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  173 

drawn  a  wor-r-rse  wan.  An'  reporters  an' 
correspondents  from  every  paper  on  the 
Coast!  It's  notoryus,  ma'am,  an'  a  credit  to 
yer  foine  mind." 

Reporters  indeed!  Out  of  the  jumble  came 
numerous  brisk  young  men  with  wads  of  yel 
low  paper  and  quick  glances  from  the  clerk 
of  the  court  to  the  prize  exhibit  of  the  day. 
A  man  with  a  camera  moved  cautiously  along 
the  wall,  apparently  jockeying  for  a  good  po 
sition  by  the  door.  Chester  reflected  upon  the 
unenviable  prominence  in  which  they  now 
found  themselves;  he  was  reminded  of  poor 
Susie,  whom  he  had  seen  a  few  minutes  ago 
out  on  Kearney  Street  being  pinched  and 
poked  by  a  morbid  mob,  eager  to  know 
whether  the  leaden  complexion  she  now  wore 
was  natural  or  merely  a  coat  of  gray  paint 
laid  over  her  really  pink  skin. 

He  was  grimly  determined  to  see  it  through 
— what  else  could  he  do  under  the  circum 
stances? — but  the  knowledge  that  they  were 
at  the  end  of  their  rope  disheartened  him  even 
before  the  law  could  do  its  worst. 

More  Chinese  feuds  were  settled  out  of 
hand.  Bow  Kin  and  Toy  Few  had  quar 
reled  over  an  opium  pipe,  with  the  result  that 


174  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Kin  had  sought  to  submerge  Few  under  a 
bowl  of  hot  rice. 

"Think  of  the  way  they  waste  food!"  was 
all  the  good  Floss  got  out  of  it;  though 
Messrs.  Bow  Kin  and  Toy  Few  were  dedi 
cated  to  thirty  days  in  the  workhouse. 

Floss  missed  nothing. 

"What's  a  workhouse  like?"  she  cheerfully 
inquired,  giving  Chester  a  nudge. 

He  didn't  know,  and  he  didn't  want  to 
know. 

Over  in  the  front  row  he  could  see  Carlot- 
ta's  serious  look  of  waiting.  Through  his  un 
happy  mind  there  swam  a  vision  of  yester 
day;  of  that  same  still,  studious  gaze  with 
which  she  had  regarded  him  as  he  delivered 
his  prize-winning  remarks  on  William  of  Or 
ange.  His  mentor,  his  light  of  leading,  his 
intellectual  guide — and  here  she  sat  in  a  pesti 
lential  court  room  waiting  to  testify  against 
him  in  the  matter  of  an  undignified  petty  of 
fense.  At  least,  thought  Chester  A.  Framm, 
his  wit  should  now  be  pitted  against  hers.  He 
would  have  that  bitter  satisfaction.  The  dra 
matic  possibilities  intrigued  his  imagination. 
He  and  Carlotta  would  fight  the  case  as  one 
lawyer  against  another. 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  175 

Officer  Doody  again  interrupted  with  the 
whispered  information  that  the  Framms 
would  be  next  on  the  docket.  And  had  they 
witnesses  ? 

"Oh,  splen-did  witnesses !"  she  smiled  peach- 
ily  up  at  her  latest  captive.  "Doctor  Hilcross 
the  specialist,  and  Doctor  Holbetter  the  chem 
ist,  and—" 

The  court  clerk  here  interrupted  with  one 
of  those  unintelligible  noises  familiar  to  court 
room  announcements.  It  was  a  continuous 
droning  bray  terminating  in  words  which 
sounded  like  "Chezera  Framm  and  Florba 
Framm." 

"I  think  he's  calling  us,"  intimated  Floss, 
tugging  at  her  husband. 

Together  they  proceeded  toward  the  awful 
seat  of  judgment.  Carlotta  had  come  for 
ward,  too,  and  Chester  was  relieved  to  see  that 
Buffalo  Willie,  true  to  his  trust,  had  assem 
bled  his  fellow  witnesses.  The  room  lay  in  an 
obliging  hush.  Several  newspaper  men  ably 
ushered  by  The  Spiggoty  had  crowded  as 
near  as  possible  to  the  bench. 

The  Framms  and  the  vengeful  Carlotta 
were  now  standing  right  under  the  fiery  top 
knot  and  acrobatic  eyebrows  of  the  most 


176  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

famous  police  judge  on  the  Pacific  Coast; 
and  Chester's  first  impression  was  of  those 
twin  hanks  of  hair  chasing  themselves  prank- 
ishly  up,  up  on  his  forehead  as  he  leaned  for 
ward.  He  smiled.  It  was  plain  to  be  seen 
that  he  had  got  sight  of  Floss  and  liked  the 
view. 

The  clerk  of  the  court  unfolded  a  disagree 
able  document  and  mumbled  over  something 
to  the  effect  that  Chezera  Framm  and  Florba 
Framm  were  charged  with  a  misdemeanor 
to  Wit.  To  Wit  seemed  to  have  vague  things 
to  do  with  smearing  house  paint  on  an  animal 
to  Wit.  There  was,  altogether,  more  wit  than 
humor  in  the  clerk  of  the  court's  mumbled 
complaint. 

"Officer  Doody!" 

His  Honor  uttered  it  in  his  great  rolling 
voice,  and  the  seraphic  policeman  came  for 
ward. 

Officer  Doody  launched  jauntily  forth  into 
his  version  of  the  adventure,  working  racily 
toward  the  climactic  scene  which  terminated 
as  follows: 

"Then  the  elephant,  Y'r  Honor,  layed  right 
down  on  the  job,  Y'r  Honor,  wreckin'  a  poosh- 
cart  an'  snorin'  like  wan  dead.  At  that  the 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  177 

la-ady  rushes  forward  an'  demands  the  arrist 
of  hot'  of  'em " 

"One  minute,  Officer  Doody."  The  magis 
trate,  who  had  continued  to  lavish  his  attentive 
glances  upon  Flossie's  hat — she  had  trimmed 
it  this  morning  with  a  long  pheasant's  feather 
— brought  his  eyebrows  down  from  their  percri 
atop  and  suggested:  "Be  more  explicit, 
please.  Which  lady  rushes  forward  and  de 
mands  the  arrest  of  both  of  what?" 

"The  Humane  Soci'ty  la-ady  demands  th' 
arrist  of  bot'  the  defendants,  if  it  please  Y'r 
Honor.  The  elephant,  which  was  a  female, 
was  a-layin'  there  quite  pink  from  head  to 
tail." 

"Pink  and  prostrate,"  soliloquized  Magis 
trate  Haroran,  who  was  evidently  a  favorite 
with  the  press,  for  several  reporters  flew  to 
their  pencils  while  the  court  room  tittered. 

"Is  the  society's  representative  present  to 
prefer  charges?" 

"Here,  Your  Honor." 

Carlotta  Beam,  pale  but  determined,  took 
her  place  in  the  midst  of  her  enemies,  and 
upon  the  invitation  of  the  court  grew  explicit. 

"The  elephant  was  found  in  a  state  of  com 
plete  collapse  which,  as  it  was  plain  to  see, 


178  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

was  superinduced  by  the  thick  coat  of  house 
paint  that  covered  its  body,  thus  interfering 
with  the  normal  functions  of  the  skin." 

"What  was  the  color  of  the  paint,  if  you 
please?" 

The  celebrated  eyebrows  had  raised  them 
selves  again  and  were  now  forming  a  merger 
with  the  superior  shock  of  auburn  hair. 

It  was  evident  that  Judge  Haroran  did  not 
admire  Carlotta  as  a  type. 

"Pink,"  she  replied  distinctly. 

The  magic  word  started  another  ripple 
throughout  the  room;  the  ripple  crescendoed 
to  a  roar. 

"Order  in  the  court!"  bleated  the  bailiff, 
though  he  himself  was  covering  his  mouth. 

"That  is  the  same  elephant  now  standing 
outside  on  Kearney  Street?" 

For  a  nervous  moment  it  looked  as  though 
the  magistrate  would  turn  and  wink  at  Flos 
sie. 

"Oh,  Mister  Judge,"  broke  in  Floss,  "that's 
Susie.  She's  the  pink  elephant,  only  she's 
been  washed  off." 

"H-m.  Circumstantial  evidence  would  go 
to  prove,  I  should  say,  that  the  elephant  sur- 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  179 

vived  the  ordeal.  However,  might  I  ask, 
Miss " 

"Beam,"  Carlotta  promptly  supplied. 

" Miss  Beam,  in  what  way  do  you  con 
sider  that  the  pink  paint  has  been  injurious 
to  the  animal's  health?" 

"The  condition  in  which  I  found  the  ele 
phant,"  Carlotta  responded  decisively,  "would 
prove  that." 

"Mrs.  Framm" — Judge  Haroran's  expres 
sion  entirely  changed;  his  eyebrows  had  come 
down  to  an  amiable  level,  his  little  eyes 
snapped  merrily — "how  can  you  prove  that 
your  house  paint  didn't  cause  the — the  down 
fall  of  Susie?" 

"In  the  first  place,"  replied  Flossie,  "she 
wasn't  painted  with  house  paint  at  all.  In  the 
second  place  Susie  was  a  damaged  elephant. 
She  has  a  weak  heart.  She's  had  spells  for 
years." 

"I  see.  And  how  can  you  prove  that  she's 
had  spells  for  years?" 

"Doctor  Hilcross  examined  her  last  night," 
replied  the  ever-ready  Floss. 

"Ah,  you  mean  Doctor  Hilcross,  the  heart 
specialist?" 

"Yes,  sir,"  chirped  Floss.     "He's  over  by 


180  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

the  door  keeping  next  to  the  ventilator.  He's 
a  crank  about  fresh  air." 

A  stocky  square  man  with  a  square  gray 
mustache  and  square  slit  of  a  mouth  was  being 
led  forward. 

"Doctor  Hilcross" — the  Court's  air  was 
ever  so  respectful — "did  you  examine  the  ele 
phant  last  night  as  the  defendant  says?" 

"I  did,"  testified  the  celebrated  heart  spe 
cialist  in  his  choppy,  chiding  tone. 

"And  what  did  you  find?" 

"A  nervous  heart,  valvular  irregularity  and 
a  murmur.  Apparently  the  trouble  had  ex 
tended  over  a  course  of  years.  Several  of 
the  circus  people  informed  me  that  the  ele 
phant  had  been  subject  to  spells  of  vertigo  at 
frequent  intervals.  This  is  not  uncommon 
among  pachydermous  animals  born  in  captiv- 
ity." 

"Would  you  say  that  yesterday's  spell  of 
vertigo  was  helped  along  a  trifle  by  the — dec 
orations?" 

"Positively  not!" 

"Thank  you,  doctor.     That  will  be  all." 

The  busy  physician,  stopping  only  to  give 
Floss  a  curt  nod,  went  his  busy  way.  But 
already  she  was  motioning  to  Buffalo  Willie, 


THE  PINK  VERDICT 181 

who  was  edging  forward,  flourishing  his 
ivory-topped  cane. 

"I've  brought  in  a  chemist/'  explained 
Floss,  holding  the  little  druggist  affectionately 
by  the  arm,  "to  tell  you  about  the  pink  stuff 
that  covered  up  Susie.  This  is  Doctor  Hoi- 
better — Nathaniel  Hawthorne  Holbetter." 

"We're  holding  quite  a  reception,"  grinned 
the  judge.  "Doctor  Holbetter,  are  you  a  qual 
ified  chemical  expert?" 

"Five  years  assistant  city  chemist,  San 
Jose,  Cal.,"  Nathaniel  Hawthorne  Holbetter 
explained  in  his  shorthand  method. 

"That  ought  to  qualify  you.  Have  you 
examined  the — beauty  preparation  which 
adorned  the  pink  elephant?" 

Judge  Haroran  was  now  having  a  perfect 
time. 

"Mixed  it  myself." 

"Ah.  Then  would  you  mind  telling  me  how, 
you  compounded  the  prescription?" 

"Delighted.  One  part  talcum,  one  part 
flour,  five  parts  water,  eosin  to  add  color. 
Sig. :  Apply  externally." 

Sensation  in  the  court.  More  bawls  for 
order. 

"Eosin,"  echoed  the  judge,  whose  eyebrows 


182  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

•*^I*^^'^^^^^'^^™M"*MM"^™'^^*^*'^^^'^^"™"**^'^**''^™^^M^^™*''*'''**'''"M'*^'>''"'"*"^ 

were  again  performing  cart  wheels  over  his 
forehead,  "sounds  violent.  Would  such  a 
chemical  superinduce  fits  in  an  elephant  ?" 

"Feed  it  to  babies!"  barked  Buffalo  Willie. 
"Often  eat  worse.  Like  it." 

"Is  this  the  formula  for  your  beauty 
cream?" 

"It  is  not,"  barked  the  little  druggist. 
"Don't  waste  that  on  elephants." 

"I  see." 

It  was  evident  that  Judge  Haroran  saw,  for 
he  was  looking  straight  into  the  lovely  eyes 
of  Flossie  Framm.  Undoubtedly  he  was  be 
witched. 

"Mrs.  Framm,"  said  he  at  last  ever  so 
gently  as  he  leaned  far  down  from  his  pulpit, 
"what  is  the  name  of  the  preparation  your 
pink  pet  was  advertising?" 

Floss  took  a  deep  breath. 

"Framm's  Angel  Bloom  Cream!" 

She  sang  it  aloud  in  a  clear  sweet  voice 
which  tinkled  into  every  corner  of  the  gloomy 
court  room. 

"Wonderful!"  said  the  eminent  jurist  He 
lowered  his  jaw  and  his  eyebrows  in  the  same 
grimace ;  he  had  leaned  far  over,  pressing  the 
tips  of  his  fingers  together  till  the  knuckles 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  183 

cracked.  "And  tell  me,  Mrs.  Framm,  do  you 
honestly  think  that  this — er — Framm's  An 
gel  Bloom  Cream  contains  any  chemical  that 
would  do  bodily  harm?" 

Flossie  had  sidled  very  close  to  the  throne, 
and  there  in  a  series  of  poses  that  could  not 
be  misinterpreted  she  turned  first  one  bloom 
ing  cheek,  then  the  other,  to  the  full  inspec 
tion  of  His  Honor's  ravished  eyes. 

"Would  you  say  that  it  has  done  any  harm 
to  me?"  she  asked  in  a  still,  small  voice. 

"Case  dismissed!"  thundered  Judge  Haro- 
ran,  racing  his  eyebrows  wildly  as  he  turned 
his  stern  gaze  upon  some  mythical  book,  sup 
posedly  reclining  on  the  desk  to  comfort  and 
to  calm  the  judicial  mind. 

Already  the  gentlemen  of  the  press  were 
abandoning  their  table  and  swarming  toward 
the  door  in  a  competitive  effort  to  head  off  the 
Framms. 

That  day  and  the  next  were  exhausting 
ones  in  the  Angel  Bloom  parlors,  where  a 
rush  of  barter  and  trade  kept  Chester  and 
Aunt  Het  jumping  from  counter  to  counter 
all  day,  and  where,  upstairs,  Flossie  was  at 
the  end  of  her  keen  little  wits  supplying  the 


184  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

press  with  interviews  sufficiently  sensational 
to  glut  her  sense  of  artistic  values. 

It  was  a  dull  season  for  murders,  politics 
and  divorce  sensations;  the  evening  papers 
had  done  the  trial  at  length  and  in  their  best 
vein.  The  Spiggoty,  who  occasionally  led  off 
humorous  news  in  the  Blade  writh  bursts  of 
lyric  rhyme,  contributed  the  following: 

There  once  was  a  girl  in  the  social  whirl 

With  an  elephant  on  her  hands. 
She  stopped  to  think:    cel  will  paint  him  pink 

And  play  to  the  big  grand  stands." 
So  she  made  a  rush  for  a  whitewash  brush 

And  a  bucket  of  Angel  Bloom — 
But,  as  soon  as   she   painted,    the   elephant 
fainted; 

So  this  is  our  tale  of  gloom. 

The  morning  papers  specialized  on  photog 
raphy.  Susie  was  again  brought  out,  deco 
rated  again  in  rose  and  white,  and  posed  in 
an  upright  position  with  Floss  sitting  on  her 
forehead.  Floss  dictated  The  Story  of  My 
Life  for  a  Los  Angeles  Sunday  edition;  and 
a  remarkable  narrative  it  was,  relating  how 
Angel  Bloom  had  been  handed  to  her  grand- 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  185 

mother  by  a  dying  Egyptologist  who  had 
stolen  it  from  a  sacred  casket  of  Ra. 

Floss  got  the  hard  words  out  of  The  Spig- 
goty's  old  set  of  encyclopedias.  Editors  all 
up  and  down  the  Coast  telegraphed  queries 
to  their  correspondents.  Free  advertising 
raged,  and  the  effect  on  the  market  was  in 
stantaneous. 

Next  evening  when  Floss  had  got  into  her 
kimono  and  was  resting  her  tired  feet  on  a 
chair  Doctor  Holbetter  stalked  into  the  scene 
with  his  usual  burden  of  ill  tidings. 

"Even  the  Chinese  drug  stores  want  it!" 
he  barked.  "Telegraphic  orders  all  up  and 
down  the  Coast.  Six  cases  to  Boston  Drug 
Store.  Window  displays  Mr.  Framm  Knows 
a  Pretty  Girl  all  over  town.  Too  bad.  Chance 
to  get  rich.  No  capital." 

"Willie,"  chirped  Floss,  "if  you  went  to 
heaven  you'd  kick  about  the  music." 

"Know  nothing  about  heaven.  Farthest 
north  I've  been's  Seattle.  But  do  know  this: 
Only  two  hundred  bottles  not  sold.  No  capi 
tal  to  manufacture  more.  No  credit.  What? 
What?" 

He  went  off  into  a  long  succession  of  clicks. 

"Aren't  you  a  reputable  citizen — aren't  you 


186  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

one  of  those  things?  Can't  you  borrow  some 
thing  on  your  drug  store?" 

"Don't  make  me  laugh."  He  stood  and 
chewed  licorice,  his  little  chin  beard  going 
busily. 

"I've  tried  all  the  banks,"  said  Chester,  who 
had  never  been  so  tired  in  his  life.  "They 
don't  regard  us  as  a  serious  concern." 

"And  I  hope  they  never  will !"  cut  in  Floss. 

"But  I  should  think  you  two  great  big  bru 
tal  men  would  be  able  to  raise  a  few  thousand 
dollars  without  all  that  to-do." 

"There's  Applethwaite " 

"He's  mad  at  me,"  Floss  informed  him. 
That  apparently  was  another  story. 

"Exhausted  our  credit  with  wholesale  drug 
concerns,"  Buffalo  Willie  chewed  on.  "Too 
bad.  Can't  fill  orders."  Click-click. 

"Oh,  well,"  yawned  Floss,  "I  suppose  I'll 
have  to  raise  the  money  in  the  morning.  And 
now  please  get  out.  I'm  going  to  bed." 

Next  morning  Chester,  who  had  been 
mournfully  seeking  credit  of  an  obscure  sav 
ings  bank  in  the  Portsmouth  Square  region, 
was  astonished  by  the  sight  of  his  Floss, 
dressed  to  kill — or  at  least  to  wound — enter- 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  187 

ing  a  small  Bohemian  restaurant  just  round 
the  corner  from  the  Municipal  Courts.  Thus 
thrown  into  the  position  of  a  domestic  spy 
he  lingered  at  a  corner  and  was  further  aston 
ished  to  observe  Judge  Haroran  step  into  the 
same  restaurant  by  another  door. 

Unworthy  jealousy  raged  in  the  heart  of 
Chester  A.  Framm.  Urged  by  the  base  in 
stinct  he  waited  a  discreet  few  minutes,  then 
followed  in  by  the  same  door  Floss  had 
taken. 

The  place,  which  specialized  in  Mexican 
food,  was  divided  into  two  small  rooms. 
Chester  took  a  table  by  the  wall  where,  peer 
ing  into  the  compartment  beyond,  he  became 
an  unseen  witness  to  the  latest  comedy  of  Flos 
sie's  invention. 

Judge  Haroran  was  eating  alone.  At  the 
table  nearest  him  Floss  was  also  eating  alone. 
They  were  facing  each  other.  The  judge  was 
reading  a  newspaper.  Floss  was  reading  an 
other.  Haroran  ordered;  Floss  ordered.  The 
judge,  who  was  apparently  in  a  forbidding 
mood,  glowered  into  the  paper,  groping  now 
and  then  for  his  food  and  pulling  it  round  the 
edge.  Floss  lowered  her  paper  now  and  then 
and  peeped  shyly  over.  Chester  could  not  re- 


188  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

strain  a  grin.    Floss  had  met  her  match  this 
time. 

The  grin  was  destined  to  linger  only  for 
the  duration  of  one  frugal  course,  for  after 
the  judge  had  emptied  his  plate,  he  lowered 
his  paper  and  glanced  toward  the  table  oppo 
site  him.  Their  eyes  met.  Haroran  bowed 
coldly  and  resumed  his  paper.  Floss  again 
took  up  her  reading. 

After  all,  thought  Chester,  Floss  was  doing 
this  for  the  Company  Ink.  Just  how  he 
could  not  fathom — but  his  sympathy  drifted 
toward  his  peculiar  little  wife.  It  was  with 
a  sort  of  triumphant  thrill,  then,  that  he  saw 
Haroran  at  last  rise  gawkily,  pay  his  score 
and  saunter  over  to  Floss'  table. 

The  meeting  was  cordial  apparently,  for 
they  shook  hands;  and  the  judge,  after  the 
manner  of  men  captivated  against  their  wills, 
seated  himself  on  the  edge  of  a  chair.  Floss 
was  going  on  in  her  animated  way,  using  her 
eyes  to  advantage,  gesturing  with  all  the 
force  of  her  eloquent  frivolity.  The  judge 
got  farther  into  his  chair,  and  before  Ches 
ter's  astonished  eyes  was  revealed  the  picture 
of  a  man  being  gradually  charmed,  entranced, 
hypnotized.  All  this  took  about  fifteen  min- 


THE  PINK  VERDICT  189 

utes,  at  the  end  of  which  time  a  waiter  inter 
rupted  the  interview  with  a  bottle  of  ink  and 
a  large  sheet  of  writing  paper. 

Chester  had  seen  enough. 

A  half  hour  later  he  met  Floss  at  a  Kear 
ney  Street  corner.  She  seemed  not  in  the 
least  surprised. 

"The  old  cherubim  and  seraphim!"  she 
smiled  through  the  heightened  color  of  her 
excitement.  "Being  one  of  those  lawyer 
things  he  couldn't  take  my  word  for  it.  So  I 
gave  him  our  note  for  ninety  days  at  seven 
per  cent." 

Chester  whistled,  having  no  more  adequate 
expression  at  his  command.  She  had  passed 
over  to  him  a  long  blue  check  which  men 
tioned  the  sum  of  five  thousand  dollars  and 
bore  the  signature  of  Michael  Henry  Haro- 
ran. 

"Well,  you  went  to  a  peculiar  place  for  it," 
was  his  last  weak  protest. 

"Mister  Geese!  That's  just  where  gold 
miners  go  for  their  gold — to  peculiar  places." 

Thereupon  she  kissed  him  affectionately, 
much  to  the  diversion  of  upper  Kearney 
Street. 


CHAPTER  XII 

HOW  SHE  INTRODUCED  HIM  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME 

THE  lapse  of  fifteen  years  is  bound  to  be 
dramatic.  It  can  make  a  rich  man  out  of  a 
poor  man,  a  beggar  out  of  a  chief;  it  can  kill 
you  dead,  dead,  dead  and  leave  an  absent- 
minded  few  to  ask  "What  has  become  of 
Jones?"  It  can  turn  your  life  into  a  sour  lit 
tle  tragedy  or  a  sweet  big  romance.  Or  it 
can  leave  you  at  a  standstill — which  is  not 
really  a  standstill  because,  as  Buffalo  Willie 
expressed  it:  "Feet  in  the  mud  and  you've 
got  to  back  up." 

Fifteen  years  after  the  adventure  with  the 
pink  elephant  found  Colonel  and  Mrs.  Ches 
ter  A.  Framm — you  notice  the  "Colonel," 
don't  you? — occupying  an  expensive  suite  at 
the  Hotel  Merlinbilt,  New  York.  "Col.  and 
Mrs.  Chester  A.  Framm,  valet  and  maid,  San 
Francisco,  Cal." — thus  it  appeared  on  the  reg 
ister.  He  could  write  it  now  without  a  quiver 
of  the  pen — that  military  title  which,  like  his 

190 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     191 

i^^mmiiimi'^^~*~mmmi>m^^~mmimm~mm^mmm^^^^~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 

chronic  hay  fever,  had  grown  upon  him  with 
the  years.  But  Floss  did  not  create  hay  fever 
— as  she  oft  reminded  him  during  sneezy 
spells;  whereas  she  never  denied  that  she 
brought  Colonel  into  his  life. 

She  had  bestowed  the  title  with  one  sweep 
of  her  helpless  little  hand.  Had  she  chosen 
to  make  him  an  earl  it  would  have  been  the 
same.  But  she  had  decided  that  Goober 
looked  military,  that  a  thingumbob  would  add 
dignity  to  his  middle-aging  personality. 
Therefore  she  had  linked  her  own  persuasive 
genius  to  The  Spiggoty's,  and  between  them 
Colonel  had  become  a  fact  A  celebrated 
series  of  street-car  advertisements,  circulated 
through  as  many  states  as  the  flag  has  stars, 
had  begun  its  appeal  with  "Colonel  Framm 
says/'  Soon  afterward  a  horde  of  small-town 
newspapers  broke  out  into  boiler-plate  witti 
cisms,  supposedly  repeated  from  the  lips  of 
Col.  Chester  A.  Framm.  No  eagles  were  ever 
won  with  less  trouble  for  the  winner. 

So  when  the  curtain  again  rose,  after  the 
above-mentioned  interval  of  time,  the  Framms 
had  been  a  fortnight  in  New  York,  and,  like 
your  true  San  Franciscan,  Chester  was  pining 
to  go  home.  A  busy  two  weeks  it  had  been, 


192  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

for  the  Company  Ink  had  now  dignified  its 
name  to  Framm's  Institute — just  what  it  insti 
tuted  was  never  made  clear ;  and  Flossie's  per 
petual  energy  had  caused  a  chain  of  parrot- 
colored  beauty  shops  to  wind  its  perfumed 
way  literally  from  California  to  Maine.  Buf 
falo  Willie  had  invented  an  original  needle 
spray,  standardized  hydropaths  had  been  pro 
vided  with  each  shop.  Thus  it  had  been  easy 
to  account  for  every  minute  of  Chester's  time 
during  these  fifteen  years  of  material  suc 
cess;  easy  to  account  for  his  nestling  into  the 
cushion  of  luxury  with  never  a  thought  for 
Carlotta  Beam  and  the  ideals  he  had  traded 
for  mere  tinsel. 

Never  a  thought,  did  I  say? 

It  was  a  late  September  morning  and  the 
Framms  were  taking  late  coffee  in  the  break 
fast  room  of  their  suite.  Had  you  studied 
them  there,  as  did  the  waiter  who  brought  in 
a  second  helping  of  fresh  butter,  you  would 
have  said  that  they  were  father  and  daughter 
instead  of  man  and  wife.  Chester  had  a  lim 
ited  imagination — Floss  discovered  that  be 
fore  she  married  him — but  he  had  a  capacity 
for  hard  work  and  was  born  with  a  powerful 
sense  of  responsibility  which  had  acted  con- 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     193 

stantly  as  a  check  and  a  balance  to  his  wife's 
amazing  artistic  flights. 

The  effort  had  aged  him.  There  lay  a  nude 
strip  along  his  skull  between  the  bump  of  ven 
eration  and  the  mound  of  philoprogenitive- 
ness.  He  was  rather  gray  above  the  ears. 
His  heavy  noble  face  was  deep-lined  and  he 
wore  eyeglasses  that  trailed  a  mournful  rib 
bon.  Yet  who  would  say  that  he  was  not  a 
proud  and  happy  man?  Hay  fever  is  the 
lightest  of  heavenly  curses,  and  no  husband 
has  ever  died  of  a  wife  who  is  always  amusing 
even  when  she  annoys.  Every  inch  a  colonel 
he  looked  that  September  morning. 

But  what  had  happened  to  Flossie  Framm 
in  the  long  wait  between  acts?  Nothing,  ap 
parently.  A  microscope  might  have  revealed 
crow's-feet  at  the  corners  of  her  wonderful 
eyes;  possibly  she  had  in  some  moment  of 
confidence  with  herself  plucked  a  half  dozen 
silver  threads  from  out  the  honey  gold  of  her 
hair.  But  Flossie  at  thirty-seven  was  still  a 
young  girl,  whereas  Chester  at  forty-one  was 
— ahem — middle-aged.  There,  I've  said  it ! 

Strange  contrast,  say  you?  Not  in  the  least, 
say  I.  Floss  had  made  her  fortune  by  jump 
ing  chasms  and  not  worrying  about  it;  Ches- 


194  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

ter  had  stood  on  the  marge  and  held  the  rope 
for  her.  And  in  such  a  combination  it  is 
usually  the  rope  holder  who  suffers  from  nerv 
ous  strain. 

"Floss,"  began  the  colonel,  mangling  the 
cube  sugar  in  the  bottom  of  his  cup,  "don't 
you  think  we  can  start  back  to  the  Coast?" 

"Old  Patch!"  she  trilled,  dropping  her  pa 
per.  Floss  read  the  papers  less  for  the  news 
than  for  weird  and  strange  advertisements 
smuggled  in  remote  corners.  "I  believe 
you're  smoking  too  many  cigars.  No  wonder 
you  have  the  sneezes.  If  you'd  only  stick  to 
cigarettes  the  way  I  do " 

"We're  through  with  business  here,"  he 
growled,  "and  we  ought  to  get  back." 

"What  would  we  be  doing  back?"  she 
asked. 

"Isn't  that  like  you?  I  thought  you  were 
crazy  about  that  new  twenty-two-room  house 
and  the  bungalow  at  San  Rafael.  And  there 
are  the  children  to  consider." 

"I  think  I'll  sell  'em,"  replied  Floss  thought 
fully;  then  becoming  aware  of  her  husband's 
horrified  look:  "Not  the  children,  of  course, 
the  messy  old  sweethearts !  But  your  mother's 
looking  after  Eva  and  Buffalo  Willie  never 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     195 

lets  Nat  get  out  of  his  sight.  Since  I  named 
the  children  for  those  two  vain  old  things  you 
may  be  sure  nothing's  going  to  happen  to 
them.  Besides,  they're  very  easy  to  manage." 

"Yes  indeed/'  replied  Chester  A.  Framm. 
"They're  like  their  mother.'' 

"Are  you  going  to  leave  me  or  something, 
Chester?"  she  asked  with  one  of  her  heart- 
melting  looks. 

"I've  got  over  that  stage,"  he  grinned  wick 
edly.  "But  what's  the  idea  about  selling  our 
Pacific  Coast  property?" 

"Oh,  we  wouldn't  sell  our  Institute  shops. 
Oh,  no!  Or  our  offices.  Never,  never,  never! 
And  we  might  rent  the  Presidio  house  to 
somebody  who  wants  to  start  a  hotel  or  keep 
boarders." 

"Florabel!"  He  only  called  her  that  upon 
occasions.  "Where  are  you  going  to  stop?" 

"I  wasn't  aware,"  she  informed  him,  'that 
I  was  going  to  stop  anywhere." 

"You  never  had  an  idea  that  didn't  run  up 
into  the  thousands." 

"Easy  come,  easy  go,"  she  reminded  him 
lightly,  reaching  down  for  the  little  pink  slip 
per  she  had  just  kicked  off. 

"That    house   cost    well    over    a   hundred 


196  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

thousand  dollars.  It  was  supposed  to  estab 
lish  us  for  life " 

"I  hope  nothing  will  ever  do  that/' 

"Do  you  intend  that  we  spend  the  rest  of 
our  time  in  hotels?" 

"Nope.  We'll  have  a  home  all  right.  But 
this  time  it'll  be  on  Fifth  Avenue." 

"With  what  idea  in  view?" 

"Ain't  none,  foolish.  Only  it's  our  move, 
that's  all.  You  remember  how  I  said,  right 
after  we  were  married,  that  we'd  make  squil- 
lions  and  squillions  of  dollars  and  I'd  have 
your  name  a  mile  high  on  all  the  billboards? 
Well,  didn't  I  keep  my  promise?" 

Chester  knew  too  well  that  she  had.  Had 
he  cared  to  glance  out  of  the  window  he  would 
have  seen  a  tall  billboard  blazing  with  "Col 
onel  Framm  says"  and  an  impressionistic  por 
trait  of  himself  beside  a  giant's  bottle  of 
Angel  Bloom. 

"Yeppy,  I  kept  my  promise,"  she  congrat 
ulated  herself.  "But  we've  worn  out  the 
Coast  We're  considered  very  rich  out  there, 
but  the  best  families  always  associate  us  with 
Kair  oil  and  cocoa-butter  massage.  Here  it's 
different  We're  merchant  princes  from  afar, 
that's  alL  Framm's  Institute  sounds  lovely 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     197 

and  dignified  and  grand.  Therefore  we  can 
just  let  out  a  mirthful  whoop  and  take  a  high 
dive  into  the  middle  of  Society.  Cheer  up, 
sexton,  we'll  be  a  long  time  dead  I" 

"Then  you'll  be  wanting  water-front  prop 
erty  at  Bar  Harbor  and  rolling  stock  to 
match." 

"Everything !"  she  cried  enthusiastically. 
"Won't  it  be  great,  Goob?  I've  picked  out 
two  or  three  houses  on  the  Avenue;  I  don't 
know  whether  we'll  take  the  Florentine- 
morgue  effect  or  the  little  white  dungeon  with 
the  marble  fruit  cake  over  the  door." 

"Whichever  you  choose,  you'll  want  to  move 
out  as  soon  as  you  get  in.  Look  at  the  money 
we  put  into  that  San  Francisco  house.  Look 
at  that  sunken  garden!  Think  of  what  we 
paid  that  landscape  architect!  And  those 
servants'  quarters — great  Scott!  They're  a 
hundred  times  more  luxurious  than  the  flat 
we  started  housekeeping  in.  And  the  banquet 
hall  alone  stood  me  nearly " 

"Goober,"  she  interrupted  in  her  best  little- 
girl  voice,  "what  was  your  idea  about  that 
banquet  hall?" 

"Mine?"  He  tried  to  look  stern,  but  only 
succeeded  in  looking  guilty. 


198  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"You  just  would  have  one  forty  feet  long 
with  room  for  a  hundred  places.  Old  sly  pie! 
Without  a  small  angel  to  watch  over  your 
pillow  you'd " 

"What  are  you  driving  at?"  He  tried  to 
restrain  a  hanging  tendency  on  the  part  of  his 
lower  jaw. 

"Goober,  you  just  perfectly  and  awfully 
well  know  that  you  had  that  room  built 
specially  so  that  you  would  get  a  chance  to 
make  big  grand  after-dinner  speeches." 

"Nothing  of  the  sort!" 

"You  fun-ny  little  hero!"  She  came  over 
and  choked  him  with  one  of  her  caresses. 
"You  won't  ever  get  over  wanting  to  be 
Cicero,  will  you?" 

"And  you'll  never  get  over  hating  the  very 
idea  of  my  exercising  my  natural  talent." 

This  was  nothing  new  with  the  Framms. 
Chester  had  been  breaking  out  like  this  on  an 
average  of  twice  a  year. 

"Is  its  poor  little  life  all  blighted  and  curled 
up  because  it  wedded  a  piece  of  fluff?"  she 
sympathized,  and  ran  her  fingers  over  the 
place  where  once  she  had  rumpled  his  abun 
dant  hair. 

"It's  a  little  late  for  me  to  start  in  with  a 


i 


"YOU  WON'T  EVER  GET  OVER  WANTING  TO  BE  CICERO, 
WILL  YOU?" 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     199 

public  career,"  he  went  on  doggedly.  "But 
at  least  I  could  learn  to  make  a  few  graceful 
speeches — take  up  the  thread  of  my  life  where 
it  was  when " 

" when  I  came  and  busted  it,"  she 

agreed. 

"You  never  will  take  me  seriously." 

"Oh,  awfully!  I  nearly  cried  the  time  you 
tried  to  address  that  street  meeting  in  Cin 
cinnati." 

"Yes.  And  you  ran  a  pin  into  my  leg 
before  I  got  started — and  pretended  it  was  a 
mistake." 

"It  was.    A  mistake  to  let  you  get  started." 

"Now  that  we're  talking  candidly,"  he 
growled,  "I  might  as  well  tell  you  that  I 
haven't  been  obtuse  to  the  way  you've  tripped 
me,  spiked  me,  put  a  spoke  in  the  wheel  every 
time  I've  tried  to  open  my  mouth  in  public. 
Good  Lord,  Floss,  I'm  neither  tongue-tied  nor 
an  idot.  Milton  speaks  of  that  one  talent 
which  is  death  to  hide " 

"And  your  one  talent  is  finance.  Goober, 
you're  the  most  reliable  business  man  I  ever 
saw.  If  you  hadn't  had  a  perfect  genius  for 
bookkeeping  and  stock  reports  and  market 
conditions  I'd  have  blown  up  the  firm  on  an 


200  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

average  of  twice  a  week  for  the  last  fifteen 
years.  How  many  times  would  that  make, 
Goob?" 

"One  thousand  five  hundred  and  sixty,"  he 
replied  without  the  slightest  hesitation. 

"There!  If  I  tried  to  add  two  and  two 
I'd  make  it  come  out  six,"  she  complained. 

"Yes,"  he  admitted:  "and  you'd  get  away 
with  it  too." 

"You're  so  unreasonable  about  me.  What 
makes  you  think  your  angel  is  standing  in 
the  way  of  your  great  big  mighty  oratorical 
gifts?" 

"Well,"  said  he,  "I  started  in  by  being  a 
very  promising  speaker." 

"Go  on."  She  had  resumed  her  chair  and 
her  cigarette. 

"I  began  life  by  winning  the  William  H. 
Barbour  prize  for  oratory.  I  may  have  been 
a  mere  boy,  but  I  made  a  decided  impres 
sion  on " 

"Weren't  you  f  un-ny !"  she  rippled.  "Stand 
ing  there  bellowing  about  William  the  Fruit- 
man  with  old  Doctor  Pindar  sitting  behind 
the  water  pitcher  looking  like  a  sacred  frog!" 

"There  you  go  again  !'* 

"Goober,  most  sweetest,  who  ever  told  you 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME 


you  could  make  a  speech?"  It  was  an  echo 
of  the  very  jibe  she  had  thrown  at  him  that 
far-away  night  of  triumph  when  he  had 
sought  her  behind  the  palms  in  a  boyish  hope 
that  she,  too,  would  be  impressed.  The  echo 
brought  clarity  to  his  mind.  Undoubtedly 
Floss  remembered  Carlotta  Beam,  just  as  he 
remembered  her.  In  that  taunt  the  expression 
of  a  lifelong  jealousy  was  sounded.  Could  it 
be  possible  that  this  strange,  capable,  frivo 
lous  little  genius  had  shaped  him  into  what  he 
was  in  order  to  show  Carlotta? 

The  tragic  name  was  already  on  his  lips, 
but  he  stayed  it  to  grumble:  "The  greatest 
gift  in  the  world,  if  it  is  purposely  discour 
aged,  starved  and  stunted,  begins  at  last  to 
atrophy  and  -  " 

"  -  mummify/'  she  prompted;  a  way  she 
had  when  he  started  a  long  sentence. 

"  -  mummify.  Before  we  were  married 
you  cried  and  made  me  promise  never  to  make 
a  speech  without  your  consent.  When  I  or 
dered  a  set  of  The  Thousand  Greatest  Ora 
tions  you  changed  the  order  so  that  when 
the  books  came  they  were  The  Thousand 
Greatest  Recipes  -  " 

"They  were   won-derful   too!"    she   inter- 


202  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

rupted.    "I  stole  a  formula  for  hair  wash  that 
we're  still  using  in  the  Institute/' 

"Then  when  we'd  begun  to  make  money 
and  the  drug  convention  in  Los  Angeles  asked 
me  for  a  fifteen-minute  address " 

"You  didn't  play  fair.  You  sneaked  away 
without  my  consent." 

"That  helped,  didn't  it?  They'd  just  called 
my  name  at  the  speakers'  table  and  I  was 
getting  on  my  feet  when  a  boy  came  in  with 
a  telegram!" 

"  'Remember  your  promise '  that  was 

what  I  wired,"  Floss  reminisced. 

"Yes,"  growled  the  Colonel,  "and  as  a  man 
of  honor,  of  course,  I  had  to  sit  down  and  put 
my  ambition  in  my  pocket." 

"You  were  always  an  honest  Injun,"  Floss 
admitted  with  a  fond,  proud  glance. 

"It's  been  that  way  from  start  to  finish.  If 
I  tried  to  study  law  at  night  the  books  got 
lost  or  you  started  a  phonograph  in  the  next 
room.  When  we  were  struggling  along  there 
was  some  excuse — you  could  always  say  that 
my  higher  ambition  cut  into  my  working  time. 
But  these  latter  years  there's  no  excuse.  I've 
given  up  hoping  to  be  a  great  public  figure. 
But  speech  making  is  a  graceful  accomplish- 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME    203 

ment  for  a  man  of  means.  Not  only  that, 
but  I've  got  time  to  look  round — there  are 
public  offices  and  diplomatic  posts  open  to  rich 
men  with  the  talent  to  fill  them.  Are  you  do 
ing  anything  to  help  me?  What  did  you  play 
on  me  on  my  last  birthday  dinner?" 

"I  always  did  hate  toasts,"  she  objected. 
"And  did  you  ever  see  a  bromide  that  didn't 
love  'em?  And  you  looked  so  fun-ny  when 
you  got  up  to  respond — just  the  way  you  did 
that  night  when  you  won  the  big  tin  medal. 
I  knew  you'd  thank  me  for  interrupting " 

"With  that  awful  story  about  how  Aunt 
Het  hugged  the  Chinaman  when  the  Hyde 
Street  car  ran  away  downhill?" 

"Well,"  she  sighed,  "people  listened  to  it, 
didn't  they?" 

"Life's  been  just  one  interruption  after  an 
other.  Last  September  when  the  International 
Cosmetic  Convention  met  in  Pittsburgh  I  had 
a  big  chance.  They  offered  to  make  me  the 
orator  of  the  evening.  You  pretended  to 
give  your  consent.  I  spent  two  hard  weeks 
working  up  that  speech." 

"It  wasn't  my  fault  that  our  machine  got 
lost  in  the  horrid  old  state  of  Pennsylvania 
and  that  we  didn't  get  into  Pittsburgh  till 


204  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

eleven  o'clock  and  all  the  Cosmetics  were 
going  home/' 

"No.  It  was  merely  an  act  of  fate.  It 
was  also  purely  accidental  that  you  slipped 
the  chauffeur  fifty  dollars. " 

This  was  rather  a  heavy  bit  of  sarcasm,  but 
it  bore  the  stamp  of  truth. 

"Poor  old  Goober,"  she  commiserated. 
"Who  ever  told  you  you  could  make  a  public 
speech  ?" 

This  was  one  jibe  too  many. 

"Carlotta  Beam  told  me,"  he  blurted  out. 
"Told  me  a  thousand  times.  And  she  was 
right.  She  had  faith  in  me." 

"Faith's  a  won-derful  thing,"  she  said,  but 
it  was  not  her  voice  that  seemed  to  speak. 
For  an  alchemic  moment  her  face  had  aged 
until  it  looked  centuries  old.  "We  built  our 
fortune  on  faith,  you  know,  old  Goober." 

He  made  no  response,  but  sat  fascinated  by 
the  strange  wise  scrutiny  she  was  giving  him. 

"Faith  can  move  mountains,"  she  said,  "but 
it  often  stubs  its  toe  on  molehills.  Goober,  I 
know  how  you  feel  sometimes.  It's  the  way 
I  used  to  want  more  hats  and  pretty  clothes 
during  those  years  we  were  living  over  the 
store — on  faith.  You  didn't  notice  that,  did 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     205 

you?  How  you  must  long  sometimes  to  find 
Carlotta  and  sit  on  a  cloud  and  make  big 
grand  beautiful  thoughts!  Why  don't  you, 
Goober?" 

"Don't  I  what?" 

"Hunt  up  Carlotta." 

Even  in  the  thrall  of  this  unique  moment 
he  hesitated  before  he  confessed. 

"I  tried  to  once.  That  was  about  four 
years  ago,  when  I  was  first  traveling  over 
the  Coast  for  the  Institute  shops." 

"Oh.     And  you  found  her?" 

Florabel's  smooth  cheeks  had  deepened  to 
peonies.  Her  eyes  narrowed  as  she  smiled. 
Again  the  little  pink  slipper  had  fallen  off. 

"No."  Chester  realized  nervously  that  he 
must  now  finish  what  he  had  so  ill  begun. 
"It  was  an  idle  notion.  But  I  wanted  to 
ask — to  ask  if  there  was  still  a  chance  for 
me  to  develop  along  the  old  lines." 

"You  perfectly  natural  Goob!"  said  Floss, 
quite  restored  and  even  interested. 

"I  wasn't  breaking  any  contract  with  you," 
he  explained  doggedly.  "I  didn't  want  to 
make  a  speech — but  I  did  want  to  know  about 
myself.  I  found  Dyak  pretty  much  run  down. 
Old  Pindar  was  dead  and  a  fellow  named 


206  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

. _ : , ., 

Mitchell  had  the  chair  of  English  Literature. 
Mitchell  said  that  the  Beams  had  been  trans 
ferred  to  some  small  Eastern  college  several 
years  ago  and  that  he  was  under  the  impres 
sion  that  Carlotta  had  married  a  professional 
man — lawyer,  politician — he  wasn't  sure 
which." 

"Whatever  he  is,"  murmured  Floss,  "she 
must  have  made  him  very  famous  by  now. 
Strange  I  haven't  seen  her  picture  in  the 
papers  next  to  the  Swedish  Ambassador  or 
the  Secretary  of  State  or  the  Grand  High 
Moocow  of  the  Elks  or " 

Her  reflection  broke  off  dramatically.  It 
was  evident  that  she  was  coming  down  with 
an  idea. 

"Goob!"  she  fairly  shrieked.  "I've  got  it. 
Got  it  by  two  hind  legs  and  a  tail!" 

"Yes?" 

"You  really  truly  want  to  make  an  appear 
ance  with  miles  of  speakers'  table  all  round 
you,  thousands  of  faces  wide  open  over  their 
demitasses,  champagne  and  limelights  going 
off  rapidly — and  you  standing  there  with  the 
loveliest  pearl-white  corded-silk  vest  and  dia 
mond  studs " 

"Crazy  again!"  was  all  he  said.     But  the 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     207 

^^^*^^^™^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 

years  had  taught  him  not  to  let  it  go  at  that. 

"Yeppy.  Testimonial  banquet  to  Col.  Ches 
ter  A.  Framm,  of  California,  held  in  the  Mer- 
linbilt  Gallery  at  eight-fifteen  sharp  on  the 
evening  of  October  eighteenth.  Patrons  of 
Honor :  Hon.  William  H.  Barbour,  the  Portu 
guese  minister,  Doctor  Sergius  van  der  Meer 
— and  o-oh,  Goober!" 

Her  eyes  widened  and  she  sat  transfixed. 

"Do  you  know  who's  stopping  now  at  this 
very  hotel?" 

Chester  couldn't  guess,  so  Flossie  was 
prompt  to  supply  the  information. 

"Michael  Henry  Haroran!  You  know — 
that  mouse-eyed  old  judge  who  tried  the  pink 
elephant  for  us?" 

"He's  Supreme  Court  Justice  Haroran 
now,"  said  Chester,  repeating  what  everybody 
knew. 

"I  don't  care  if  he's  king  of  Europe,"  she 
declared;  "I'll  get  him  to  head  the  list  of 
patrons  of  honor." 

'Til  bet  you  can't,"  he  challenged. 

"I'll  bet  I  can,"  she  took  him  up. 

"Now  let's  hurry !  You  ring  up  The  Spig- 
goty  and  tell  him  to  come  right  over.  And 


208  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

I'll  get  dressed  and  see  the  management  about 
hiring  their  banquet  hall  and " 

"Floss !"  Chester  would  never  learn.  "You 
can't  do  anything  like  that.  In  the  first  place 
I  don't  know  that  I  want  to  throw  away 
several  thousand  dollars." 

"Foolish,  it  won't  cost  us  a  cent.  There 
are  about  ninety  million  people  round  New 
York  who  do  nothing  but  wait  for  banquets 
with  big  names  attached  to  them.  Five  dol 
lars  a  plate  and " 

"In  the  second  place  we're  perfectly  un 
known  here." 

"That's  the  very  thing  we  aren't  going  to 
be  on  the  morning  of  October  eighteenth. 
How  does  that  listen  to  my  sweetheart?  Life 
long  ambition  all  in  a  gob — presidents  and 
senators  and  millionaires  sitting  round  drink 
ing  your  words  and  California  champagne  at 
Paris  prices.  What's  the  matter,  Old  Nui 
sance?  Would  um  prefer  some  nice  Bolshe- 
viki  meeting  out  on  Union  Square  ?  Whatever 
you  say,  old  dear." 

This  was  astonishing.  Apparently  Floss 
had  reversed  herself  in  a  manner  hitherto 
unknown  to  that  dextrously  reversing  char 
acter.  Not  only  was  she  permitting  his  public 


INTRODUCED  TO  IMMORTAL  FAME     209 

appearance — she  was  even  forcing  it  on  him. 
There  must  be  a  joker  somewhere. 

"Well,  you  might  go  ahead  and  see  how 
you  get  along,"  he  permitted. 

"If  I  go  ahead  it'll  get  along,"  she  assured 
him  with  her  supreme  conceit.  "Now  come 
on.  We'll  array  ourselves  in  the  rich  embroid 
eries  befitting  our  station  and  tackle  old 
Supreme  Roar" — her  version,  apparently,  of 
Supreme  Court  Justice  Haroran. 

When  they  were  dressed  for  the  adventure 
Chester  was  already  committed  to  her  pro 
gram.  He  felt  like  a  boy  again. 

"Lucky,"  said  he,  "that  the  change  of  cli 
mate  has  cleared  up  my "  He  never  men 
tioned  the  disagreeable  malady. 

"Your  hay  fever,"  she  supplied.  "It's  the 
first  time  in  ten  years  you  haven't  sneezed 
all  the  way  from  Halloween  to  Christmas." 

"Getting  away  from  those  flowers  always 
helps,"  he  assured  her. 

The  very  thought  of  California's  drying 
herbage  gave  him  a  gentle  tickling  at  the  base 
of  his  nose. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

A  FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR 

THE  Florabel  Framm  Technic  or  Quick 
Roads  to  Fame  might  with  advantage  be 
introduced  as  a  text  book  in  our  leading  com 
mercial  schools;  and  Chester's  experiences  of 
that  late  September  morning  should  be  writ 
ten  into  an  important  chapter. 

When  she  had  got  him  into  his  braided 
morning  coat  and  herself  into  one  of  the  most 
exquisite  creations  from  the  workshop  of 
Fluere  she  took  a  look  in  the  mirror  and  said 
"Messy  thing!"  once  or  twice.  The  messy 
thing  proved  to  be  an  eighty-dollar  hat  with 
a  flowing  white  ostrich  feather. 

"I  look  like  one  of  those  Knights  of  Pythi 
as,"  she  commented. 

Wherefore  she  tore  off  the  white  feather, 
tucked  into  its  place  a  yard  of  cloudy  blue 
velvet  and  was  immediately  cheered.  Fluere 
might  have  imitated  the  effect.  As  a  matter 
of  fact  one  milliner  did,  so  I  am  told. 

2IO 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR 


"Come  on,  Mister  Slow,"  she  commanded; 
and  her  smooth-coated  spouse  followed  into 
the  first  phase  of  the  adventure. 

The  Supreme  Roar  occupied  a  suite  on  the 
fourth  landing.  When  at  last  they  were  ad 
mitted  to  his  big  reception  room  they  found 
him  deep  in  conference  with  many  dignified 
gentlemen  of  about  his  own  age.  Time  as  well 
as  fortune  had  wrought  dramatic  changes  in 
Michael  Henry  Haroran  since  the  days  of  the 
pink  elephant.  The  two  hairy  rodents,  which 
still  scampered  across  his  forehead,  had  turned 
to  white  mice  and  his  once  auburn  hair  had 
now  become  a  beautiful  bank  of  snow.  You 
would  have  recognized  him  on  or  off  the  stage 
as  the  Supreme  Court  Justice.  His  large 
heavy  voice  had  increased  in  volume  and  he 
was,  upon  the  entrance  of  the  audacious 
Framms,  lecturing  upon  the  maritime  laws  of 
1852. 

"The  clipper  ship  Ben  Harrow  had  now  lost 
her  status  as  a  merchantman,  and  by  the  very 
nature  of  her  cargo  had  reverted  to  —  had 
reverted  to  -  " 

Flossie  Framm,  never  moving  from  her 
place  on  the  carpet,  had  undoubtedly  hypno 
tized  him.  The  Supreme  Roar  shut  off  the 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


floodgates  of  the  law  and  looked  across  the 
room.  The  white  mice  which  had  been  play 
ing  tag  across  his  forehead  scampered  up  and 
hid  under  the  snow  bank.  Then  they  ran 
down  and  rested  still  as  death  above  the  bright 
judicial  eyes. 

'Well,  upon  my  word!"  bellowed  the  great 
man,  abandoning  his  audience  and  springing 
forward.  "If  this  isn't  Mrs.  Framm!" 

"Thank  you,  judge!"  cried  Flossie,  accept 
ing  both  his  hands.  "We  nearly  drowned 
listening  to  the  clipper  ship  Ben  Harrow,  and 
neither  of  us  can  swim  a  stroke.  What's  a 
clipper  ship,  Judge  Haroran?" 

"Something,  my  dear,  which  was  never  de 
signed  for  the  comfort  of  tenderly  reared 
young  ladies.  And  what  have  we  on  our 
pretty  mind  to-day?  Another  pink  elephant?" 

Supreme  Court  Justice  Haroran  opened  his 
large  mouth  and  bellowed  forth  a  salute  to 
his  own  joke.  Chester  found  himself  tittering 
appreciatively,  as  one  does  when  a  great  man 
jests.  "Had  I  followed  my  star/7  he  was 
thinking,  "I  too  might  be  holding  levees  every 
morning  and  showering  ponderous  compli 
ments  upon  the  wives  of  obscure  millionaires." 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR 


"It's  a  white  elephant  this  time/'  Floss  was 
saying. 

"White?"  The  two  mice  of  the  same  color 
stood  up  and  performed  an  acrobatic  feat. 

"Yeppy.    My  husband." 

"Ah,  your  husband!" 

Judge  Haroran  remembered  Chester  long 
enough  to  shake  him  warmly  by  the  hand. 

"You  hadn't  much  to  say,  as  I  remember  it, 
during  the  celebrated  case.  But  you  were  in 
deed  fortunate  in  your  choice  of  counsel,  Mr. 
Framm." 

"Colonel  Framm,"  corrected  Flossie. 

"Colonel  Framm,"  conceded  Mr.  Justice 
Haroran.  "Suppose  we  go  in  here  and  sit 
down  long  enough  for  the  clipper  Ben  Harrow 
to  round  Cape  Horn." 

He  led  them  into  a  small  green-and-gold 
anteroom  and  as  soon  as  his  guests  were 
seated  caused  a  spindling  gilt  chair  to  creak 
under  his  weight,  for  Judge  Haroran  was 
growing  stout.  He  beamed  amiably  upon 
Chester,  but  the  look  he  held  for  Flossie  was 
sentimental  in  the  extreme.  Sentiment  min 
gled  with  the  impatient  curiosity  of  a  busy 
man. 

"When  I  found  that  your  name  was  on  tHe 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


register/'  Floss  went  directly  at  her  subject, 
"I  cried—  didn't  I,  Chester?  That  won-derful 
loan  you  made,  and  the  won-derful  way  you 
did  it  !" 

"Pshaw!"  snorted  the  eminent  one.  "You 
paid  it  back  in  ninety  days  —  fifteen  minutes' 
margin.  You're  prompt  as  well  as  beautiful, 
my  dear." 

Chester  jumped.  Promptness  was  a  virtue 
which  he  had  never  associated  with  his  bride. 

"Of  course  you  thought  I  was  crazy,  judge. 
But  you  don't  know  what  that  money  meant 
to  us."  There  were  tears  in  her  bright  eyes, 
and  Chester  was  not  scornful,  for  he  knew 
that  her  whimsical  words  held  but  the  plain 
truth.  "Did  you  ever  see  a  fly  with  just  one 
leg  stuck  in  the  fly  paper  struggling  and 
struggling  to  get  loose,  holding  up  its  little 
paws  to  the  other  flies  to  come  down  and  lend 
a  hand?  Nothing  doing.  Well,  that  was  us  — 
only  different.  Because  we  knew  that  if  we 
ever  got  foot-  free  we  could  just  walk  over 
hills  and  mountains  of  precious  stones.  You 
pulled  us  out  of  the  goo,  judge.  And  here 
we  are.  Chester's  one  of  the  best-known  pub 
lic  men  in  the  state  of  California,  and  that  five 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR    215 

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^m*m~iii^mm'^imm**~~mm~m*~^~'^m^^~m*i~**mmmim*m*~~m~'^~mi*1^*. 

thousand  you  lent  us  has  swelled  up  to  five 
millions.    Isn't  it  five  millions,  Chester?" 

"Seven,"  reported  her  financial  head  briefly. 

"He's  won-derful  at  figures.  Chester,  how 
many  skin  specialists  do  we  employ  in  our 
institutes  all  over  the  country?" 

"A  hundred  and  twenty-two." 

"Just  listen  at  him!  And  everything's  in 
proportion.  And  that's  why  we've  come  to 
you,  Judge  Haroran." 

"To  me?    I'm  charmed." 

"You  see  the  colonel's  public  duties  have 
kept  him  pretty  much  on  the  Coast.  But  when 
the  Golden  Poppy  Society  heard  that  we  were 
intending  to  make  New  York  our  headquar 
ters  they  came  round  to  us  and  fairly  begged 
to  be  allowed  to  give  the  colonel  a  testimonial 
banquet." 

Judge  Haroran  looked  surprise;  not  half  so 
surprised  as  Chester  A.  Framm  felt  at  that 
moment. 

"I've  been  away  from  California  for  seven 
years,"  he  confessed.  "What  is  this  Golden 
Poppy  Society?" 

"I  thought  ev-erybody  had  heard  of  the 
Golden  Poppy  Society,"  she  murmured,  look 
ing  truly  disappointed.  "It's  quite  a  new 


216  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

organization — just  being  formed  by  people 
who  have  come  away  from  the  Coast.  Object: 
To  make  Calif  or  nians  feel  at  home  in  New 
York." 

"I  feel  slighted  not  to  have  been  asked," 
intimated  Haroran  with  a  wink  at  Chester. 

'Til  have  them  put  your  name  down  right 
away." 

"Ah.  When  is  this  testimonial  banquet  to 
be  held?" 

"On  the  eighteenth  of  October,"  she  replied 
without  the  least  hesitation.  "It's  to  be  held 
in  the  Merlinbilt  banquet  hall;  or  possibly  in 
the  Waldoria  or  the  Fitz-Caldron.  That 
hasn't  been  decided.  But  the  main  point  is 
you." 

"Me?"  he  queried,  forgetting  his  Supreme 
Courtly  grammar. 

"It's  a  sort  of  delicate  point,  judge.  Hon 
est,  I  don't  know  how  to  begin." 

Plainly  she  was  confused  by  her  own  au 
dacity,  for  one  of  her  most  becoming  blushes 
suffused  her  cheeks.  Judge  Haroran  leaned 
over  and  stroked  her  hand,  a  fatherly  caress. 

"You  surely  wouldn't  be  bashful  with  me!" 
he  coaxed. 

"There!    You've  made  it  better,  old  dear. 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR 


Now  I'm  going  to  say  it  all  in  one  breath. 
The  Golden  Poppies  want  your  name  to  head 
the  list  of  patrons,  but  they  didn't  have  the 
nerve  to  ask.  And  I  insisted,  sort  of,  so  they 
told  me  that  I'd  have  to  do  it.  So  here  we 
are.  It  was  a  mean  trick  to  play  on  me, 
judge,  and  if  you  feel  like  sentencing  me  and 
the  colonel  for  sixty-five  or  seventy  days  -  " 

A  secretarial  young  man  had  now  intruded 
upon  the  conversation  and  stood  conspicuously 
apart,  in  the  way  secretarial  young  men  have. 

"What  is  it,  Sherman?"  asked  the  great 
man,  truly  annoyed  at  the  interruption. 

"Judge  Wimbleton,  sir/' 

"Oh,  yes.  Tell  him  I'll  be  right  in."  Then 
he  returned  to  the  subject  of  interest.  "So 
they  made  you  do  the  hard  work,  my  dear? 
Well,  well!" 

"And  will  you?"  she  pleaded  breathlessly. 

"Cer-tainly  !  Cer-tainly  !  What  date  did  you 
say?" 

"October  eighteenth.  Aren't  you  a  dar 
ling?" 

Judge  Haroran  smiled  reminiscently.  Prob 
ably  she  had  said  just  that  the  day  he  signed 
the  check. 


218  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"H-m.  Use  my  name — delighted.  And 
you'll  excuse  me,  won't  you?" 

"How  can  you  be  so  nice  and  be  a  lawyer  ?" 
cooed  Flossie,  rising  with  him. 

"It  has  been  done,"  he  admitted,  giving  his 
illustrious  hands  to  both  the  Framms  at  once. 

And  here  was  where  Floss  really  delivered 
her  stroke: 

"If  I  had  the  nerve  to  ask — you  won't  kill 
me,  will  you?" 

"Girl-slaughter  is  one  of  the  luxuries  de 
nied  the  Supreme  Court,"  he  grinned. 

"Well,  do  you  think  you  would  have  time 
to  come  and  sit  at  the  speakers'  table  and 
make  a  speech?" 

The  white  mice,  which  had  remained  dor 
mant  during  most  of  the  parley,  now  began 
leaping  one  over  the  other,  threatening  escape 
from  the  judicial  forehead. 

"My  dear,"  he  growled,  "what  in  the  world 
would  I  speak  about?" 

"Oh,  I  could  think  up  a  speech." 

"Ah.    And  what  would  it  be,  my  dear?" 

"The  Supreme  Court  has  just  passed  a 
thingumajig  to  discourage  those  horrid  pat 
ent-medicine  fakers.  Suppose  you  talk  about 
that." 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR  219 

™"™"  ~~™ "  --""••"— -  " •—  — '  •*-  nmmimitmmm^f^^mmtmmmtm^^i^^^^ 

The  secretarial  young  man  had  again  en 
croached  and  stood  suggestively  at  the  thresh 
old. 

"Fll  be  here  until  Friday/'  said  Judge 
Haroran.  :"Good  morning — and  you  may  use 
my  name  on  the  program." 

When  the  Framms  got  out  into  the  hall  they 
moved  silently  upon  the  lift,  which  they  took 
up  to  the  eleventh  floor,  the  scene  of  their 
apartment. 

"What's  this  Golden  Poppy  Society?" 
grumbled  Chester  as  soon  as  they  had  got 
out  on  the  landing. 

"It's  me,"  said  Floss.  "I  thought  it  up 
while  we  were  going  down  in  the  elevator." 

They  found  The  Spiggoty  waiting  patiently, 
as  the  Framm  press  agent  should,  in  the  draw 
ing-room  of  their  suite.  It  was  a  fashionable 
Spig  now,  addicted  to  robin's-egg-blue  collars 
and  tan-topped  shoes,  adornments  becoming  to 
his  Latin  type  of  beauty.  He  had  represented 
the  Framm  publicity  in  the  East  for;  man^ 
years,  hence  had  become  a  sturdy  Broadwaj> 
ite. 

"Spig!"  shouted  Floss,  pulling  off  her  smart 
headpiece  and  waving  it  till  the  blue  velvet 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


fell  out  of  the  crown.  "Hell  is  popping  out 
of  Harlem.  Let's  jazz  !" 

She  fell  into  his  deft  embrace  and  together 
they  executed  a  few  steps  of  the  latest  con 
tortion. 

"Whose  life  have  you  been  spoiling  now?" 
asked  the  Spaniard  as  soon  as  he  had  recov 
ered  his  breath. 

"Chester's,"  she  announced  enthusiastically. 
"The  Golden  Poppy  Society  of  California  is 
going  to  tender  him  a  grand  testimonial  ban 
quet  on  the  evening  of  October  eighteenth." 

"The  Golden  which?" 

"Poppy  Society.     It  isn't  formed  yet." 

"Well,  who's  going  to  form  it?" 

"You  are." 

"Ami?" 

"Yeppy.  Right  away.  What  are  we  paying 
you  twelve  thousand  a  year  for?  Therefore 
you  must  go  forth  into  the  byways  and  shy- 
ways  and  pick  up  all  the  Calif  ornians  you  find 
loose  —  most  of  'em  are.  I  give  you  forty- 
eight  hours.  Sort  'em  out,  dust  'em  off,  find 
out  who's  the  richest  and  make  him  president. 
Then  say  that  Supreme  Court  Justice  Haroran 
and  the  Hon.  William  H.  Barbour  want  the 
society  to  give  Chester  a  banquet." 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR 


"Barbour's  never  said  he  would  lend  his 
name,"  was  Chester's  comment. 

"He  will,"  was  Flossie's. 

"Man  can  die  but  once,"  was  The  Spig- 
goty's. 

So  together  they  put  on  their  hats  and  went 
out  into  the  world. 

Floss  came  back  with  William  H.  Bar 
bour's  scalp  and  other  trophies  at  the  dressing 
hour  that  night. 

"He  was  a  crosspatch,"  she  informed  Ches 
ter  as  her  maid  was  hooking  her  into  a  pink 
thing  with  an  exaggerated  V  in  the  back. 
"But  I  told  him  that  Judge  Haroran  was  to 
be  speaker  of  the  evening  and  that  you  had 
made  your  start  in  life  —  ahem!  —  by  winning 
the  William  H.  Barbour  medal.  The  old  thing 
looks  like  a  giant  ground  sloth.  If  he  ever 
runs  for  President  again  I'm  going  to  vote 
the  socialist  ticket.  But  he's  fallen  in  love 
with  me  —  the  way  prehistoric  mammals  fell  in 
love  with  the  top  leaves  on  carboniferous 
trees.  Ain't  that  a  grand  word?" 

"And  he  lent  his  name?"  shouted  Chester 
from  the  other  room,  where  he  was  having  his 
lawn  tie  caressed  by  a  Japanese  valet. 


222  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"Sure !  He  wouldn't  let  the  Supreme  Roar 
get  ahead  of  him.  But  when  I  asked  him  to 
speak  he  showed  his  buck  teeth  and  I  got  out 
before  he  began  nibbling  the  feathers  off  my 
hat.  And  I've  seen  all  the  banquet  halls  in 
New  York.  There's  one  in  the  Waldoria  with 
a  picture  of  Venus  and  Apollonaris  spraddled 
all  over  the  ceiling.  I'm  sure  it  was  painted 
by  a  German,  it's  so  vulgar  and  homelike." 

"Which  one  are  we  going  to  take?"  asked 
Chester,  who,  his  evening  tie  having  been 
knotted,  appeared  beside  his  wife's  mirror. 

"All  the  hotel  proprietors  are  jealous  as 
opera  singers.  You  never  saw  the  beat  of  it ! 
I  really  believe  if  we  keep  it  up  they'll  pay 
us  to  give  that  banquet.  It  seems  they  lose 
money  every  night  their  banquet  halls  are 
empty,  and  when  I  told  them  I  wanted  one 
they  followed  me  round  like  regular  Romeos. 
One  of  the  proprietors — the  fat  one  with  the 
nice  eyes — offered  to  supply  a  list  of  people. 
But  the  manager  of  the  Merlinbilt  was  the 
wildest  of  the  lot.  He  promised  to  furnish  all 
the  printing,  including  twenty-five  hundred 
invitations  and  souvenir  menus  with  your 
photo  in  a  frame  of  golden  poppies.  I  think 
we'll  choose  the  Merlinbilt,  after  all/' 


FAVOR  FROM  THE  SUPREME  ROAR 


"And  the  matter  of  guests?"  suggested  the 
practical-minded  Framm. 

"Jersey  is  full  of  people  who  do  nothing  but 
sit  round  waiting  for  the  next  banquet.  Five 
dollars  a  plate  is  nothing  to  th'em.  The  man 
ager  says  he  knows  a  Tammany  Hall  assem 
blyman  who  wants  to  be  governor.  Won't 
we  have  the  grand  speeches  ?" 

'Til  see  a  nose-and-throat  specialist  in  the 
morning/'  soliloquized  Chester,  "and  have  him 
make  sure  that  my" — he  almost  said  hay  fever 
— "my  condition  is  all  right.  Then  I'll  go  to 
work  composing  my  speech." 

"What  are  you  going  to  talk  about,  Did 
Brutal?" 

She  had  been  turning  her  vain  little  head 
'from  left  to  right,  but  he  could  see  that  her 
reflection  was  studying  him  from  the  mirror. 

"Ahem.     The  Secret  of  Success." 

"The  Secret  of  Success!" 

She  turned  and  struck  a  pompous  pose. 

"Great  Scott !  Haven't  you  got  over  mock 
ing  me?" 

"Kiss  me  quick — and  let's  go  down  to  din 
ner.  The  Spiggoty's  brought  his  new  wife. 
Jealous  little  dog,  he  just  married  her  to  spite 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


me!  Then  we'll  have  the  Hector  Macawbers 
and  the  Phil  Jasons.  Oh,  gosh!" 

She  breathed  deep. 

The  Macawbers  and  the  Jasons  were  rich 
people  on  the  fringe  of  society,  whom  the 
Framms  had  encountered  in  a  business  way. 
Briefly,  they  were  large  stockholders  in  the 
perfumery  trust 

"Light  stuff!"  remarked  Chester,  studying 
the  public  manner  so  soon  to  be  his  by  right. 

"Aren't  they!  We're  going  to  leap  from 
roof  to  roof  all  night,  stopping  to  dance  wher 
ever  it's  noisiest.  I'm  wild  to  dance  !  I  want 
to  whirl  and  whirl  till  I'm  sick  for  the  rest 
of  my  natural  life.  Hurry  up,  pokums!  I 
seem  to  be  always  waiting  for  you  to  finish 
dressing/' 

Which  was  justice  as  administered  by 
Florabel  Framm. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT 

THIS  is  not  an  account  of  a  public  execu 
tion,  but  I  am  forced  to  admit  that,  as  would 
befit  an  execution,  the  morning  of  October 
eighteenth  dawned  clear  and  cold  and  the 
prisoner  after  a  restless  night  awoke  early 
and  ate  a  hearty  breakfast  of  ham  and  eggs. 

"You  ought  to  stop  going  over  that  thing," 
Flossie  told  him,  remarking  that  his  lips  were 
moving  over  his  coffee  cup.  "A  real  bright 
actor  once  told  me  that  the  more  you  say 
your  part  over  the  worse  you  get.  He  said 
that  once  he  was  playing  Shakspere  or  Omar 
Khayyam — some  grand  play — and  he'd  been 
saying  his  speech  over  to  himself  so  long  that 
he  forgot  how  to  talk,  so  they  had  to  ring 
down  the  curtain  in  the  middle  of  the  big 
automobile  scene  because " 

"Don't!"  groaned  the  miserable  creature. 

"Don't  what?"  She  dropped  the  morning 
paper  and  looked  truly  alarmed.  "There!  If 

225 


226  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

you  don't  get  your  mind  off  that  oration  you'll 
have  a  gallstone  attack  or  something.  Let's 
be  cheerful  in  spite  of  the  banquet.  Did  you 
see  the  lovely,  lovely  souvenir  menu  cards  the 
management  is  getting  out?  Take  it  home 
and  try  it  on  your  piano." 

She  fluttered  over  to  a  table  and  brought 
back  two  samples  of  the  Merlinbilt's  sump 
tuary  art,  and  one  of  these  she  dropped  on 
the  table  beside  the  nervous  prisoner's  ham 
and  eggs. 

Chester  was  aware  of  the  blue-and-gold 
marvel  which  framed  his  own  features,  won 
derfully  reproduced  in  soft  brown  tints.  It 
jwas  a  fine  portrait  of  a  man,  thought  Chester, 
and  should  he  make  good  to-night  the  likeness 
would  serve  splendidly  to  advertise  the  new 
senator  from  California  or  our  next  ambassa 
dor  to  the  Court  of  St.  James.  On  the  first 
inside  page  there  swam  before  his  eyes  the 
pompous  list  which  was  to  make  the  occasion 
notable : 

PATRONS  OF  HONOR 

MR.  JUSTICE  MICHAEL  HENRY  HARORAN 
HON.  WILLIAM  H.  BARBOUR 
BARON  DA  CAMOENS 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT 


BARONESS  DA  CAMOENS 
DR.  SERGIUS  VAN  DER  MEER 
SIG.  HENRICI  CRUSOE 
THE  EARL  OF  DUFF 
LADY  DUFF 

"The  Spiggoty  tells  me,"  Floss  enthused  at 
this  interval,  "that  this  is  the  finest  list  of 
patrons  that  never  came  to  a  banquet." 

"You  mean  to  say  they're  not  coming!" 
Chester  said  this  with  a  tone  of  relief. 

"Mister  Simple!  Patrons  of  honor  never 
go  to  the  dinners  they  patronize.  They  just 
put  down  their  names  and  go  to  the  movies. 
But  Spig's  arranged  it  so  that  all  the  papers 
will  say  :  'Among  those  present  were  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  William  H.  Barbour,  the  Earl  and  Earl 
ess  of  Duff'  —  whole  tribes  of  famous  people. 
Just  keep  your  mind  on  that,  boss.  Two  or 
three  ex-Presidents,  a  whole  flock  of  colonels, 
the  world's  champion  middleweight  tenor,,  am 
bassadors  of  every  shape,  size  and  color.  And 
then  I've  loaned  twenty-two  of  my  ball  gowns, 
and  Ethel  Macawber's  loaned  twelve  and  Belle 
Jason  four  —  —  " 

"Furnishing  clothes  for  the  patronesses?" 


228 THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

he  grunted,  his  mind  still  wild  with  the  details 
of  that  speech. 

"Somebody's  got  to  sit  in  the  galleries — 
haven't  you  thought  of  that?  Spig  and  I  fixed 
it  Belle  and  Ethel  have  loaned  all  their 
servants  and  told  them  to  bring  friends. 

"I  see." 

"And  tickets!  Goob,  we've  got  to  crush 
seven  million  people  into  a  room  that  holds 
less  than  five  hundred.  Of  course  we'll  be 
raided  by  the  police.  Won't  it  be  furious?" 

The  telephone  rang. 

"Hello,  Spig!"  crowed  Florabel  into  the 
mouthpiece.  "Yeppy!  .  .  .  Oh,  he's  all  right, 
except  his  lips — they're  sort  of  blue.  ...  I 
know,  it's  a  disgrace  the  way  we'll  have  to 
overcrowd  them.  .  .  .  What's  that?  Open  up 
the  Klondike  gamblers'  next  door  and  hold  an 
overflow  ? 

"That's  a  grandiloquent  thought,  old  lovely. 
Be  here  at  eleven-thirty  and  we'll  hang  the 
bunting.  Good-by." 

"I'm  going  out,"  gulped  Chester  A.  Framm. 

"That's  right,  sweetheart.  Walk  and  ride 
and  jump  into  the  river.  Go  see  your  eye- 
nose-ear-throat-lung-and-brain  specialist,  but 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT 


don't  fail  to  get  back  by  six.  I've  got  to  hang 
you  all  over  with  clothes  to-night/' 

It  was  evident  that  Floss  was  taking  her 
excitement  in  her  own  particular  way. 

Chester  went  moodily  forth,  a  prey  to  anxi 
ety  on  the  eve  of  greatness.  His  destination 
was  the  specialist  of  innumerable  talents 
whom  his  wife  had  mentioned,  but  his  walk 
that  morning  was  a  meandering  affair.  The 
past  few  weeks  had  been  audacious  weeks  and 
Chester  had  a  feeling  that  he  was  getting  run 
down  and  needed  a  rest  in  some  quiet  island 
where  even  the  birds  were  forbidden  to  sing. 
Ho'w  the  efficient  Spiggoty  had  formed,  al 
most  over-night,  the  now  vigorous  Golden 
Poppy  Society;  how  he  had  pitted  a  California 
real-estate  operator  and  a  Calif  ronia  congress 
man  one  against  the  other  in  the  race  for  the 
Poppies'  presidency;  how  deftly  Floss  had 
dined  Mr.  Junius  McKoncle,  made  him  presi 
dent  of  the  Poppies  and  wheedled  him  into 
the  Framm-testimonial  idea;  how  Floss  had 
used  the  great  names  of  Barbour  and  Haroran 
as  loadstones  to  draw  to  her  other  great 
names;  how  the  newspapers  had  taken  up  the 
enterprise,  now  in  satire,  now  in  praise  —  all 
this  had  become  ancient  history  to  him. 


230  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

His  principal  thought  was  upon  himself,  his 
speech.  Even  at  this  late  date  there  were  cer 
tain  points  where  the  oration  could  be  bettered 
by  a  few  local  touches  perhaps — or  reference 
to  the  national  situation.  The  most  eminent 
platform  favorites  had  a  way  of  passing 
gracefully  from  the  general  to  the  particular. 
Possibly  his  style  Wets  a  little  severe  and 
classic.  Possibly  it  would  have  been  better 
had  he  borrowed  a  few  of  Flossie's  epigrams 
' — the  one  about  the  New  York  Subway  play 
ing  whale  to  five  million  Jonahs.  Undigni 
fied. 

"Ladies  and  gentlemen  of  the  Golden  Poppy 
Society:  It  is  with  mingled  pain  and  joy  that 
I  stand  before  you  to-night  and  acknowledge 
the  high  compliment  which,  in  my  heart  of 
hearts,  I  know  that  I  have  done  so  little  to 
deserve " 

"Hear!  Hear!"  a  mocking  echo  of  Floss 
was  shouting  in  his  ears. 

" — . —  pain  because  this  glimpse  of  so  many 
dear  home  faces  awakens  in  my  breast  sad 
memories  of  happy  hours  now  forever  van 
ished  and  gone." 

He  had  gone  over  this  paragraph  on  an 
average  of  thirty  times  a  day  for  the  last 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT 


twenty  days.  "How  many  times  does  that 
make,  old  Nuisance  ?"  Floss  would  have  asked 
him  just  to  test  his  arithmetical  genius.  He 
had  never  uttered  the  speech  in  Floss'  hearing. 
What  he  needed  after  all  was  sympathy  and 
understanding.  For  instance,  what  comfort  it 
would  have  given  him  could  he  have  laid  the 
case  before  his  wife,  secure  in  the  feeling  that 
she  would  know  and  help!  Hadn't  he  put 
too  much  stress  on  the  pain  he  was  hypo- 
thetically  confessing  at  the  sight  of  so  many 
faces  of  bygone  days?  Possibly  a  joyous  note! 
How  was  it  that  Floss  had  expressed  the 
Subway  and  Jonah  ?  Oh  for  a  true  counselor 
out  of  his  difficulty?  Carlotta.  .  .  . 

It  was  some  minutes  after  one  o'clock  when 
he  finished  his  reverie  and  limped  into  the 
office  of  the  helpful  throat-and-nose  specialist. 

Half  past  six.  Chester  slouched  back  to  his 
apartment  in  the  Merlinbilt,  and  it  enraged 
him  somehow  to  find  Flossie  mirthfully  pass 
ing  cocktails  to  The  Spiggoty  and  The  Spig- 
goty's  bride.  Already  they  were  rigged  like 
the  clipper  Ben  Harrow.  Mrs.  De  Silva,  a 
lithe  saucer-eyed  blonde,  had  been  married  out 
of  the  chorus,  and  in  order  to  maintain  her 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


new  status  she  behaved  in  a  manner  which 
was  dignified  to  the  verge  of  paralysis. 

"The  funeral  is  kept  waiting  and  the  corpse 
not  dressed  yet  !"  Floss  began  it  almost  before 
he  had  come  into  the  room. 

"Floral  tributes  a  mile  high/'  chipped  in 
The  Spiggoty,  whose  manner  toward  Chester 
sometimes  held  an  annoying  remnant  of  Gam 
ma  superiority. 

"Flowers!"  moaned  Chester. 

The  telephone  rang,  smothering  further 
protests. 

"You  answer  it,  Spig,"  drawled  Floss,  still 
pleased  to  see  her  dark  adorer  waiting  on  her. 

De  Silva  sprang  to  the  receiver.  His  bride 
stiffened  slightly. 

"What's  the  name,  please?  ...  Oh!  J. 
Fawcett  Tweed?  Yes,  Mr.  Tweed."  The 
Spiggoty  turned  and  winked  at  his  audience. 
.  .  .  "No,  he  i§n't  in.  ...  I  can't  say,  Mr. 
Tweed.  Sorry.  .  .  .  Good-by." 

"J.  Fawcett  Tweed!"  gurgled  The  Spiggoty 
as  he  smote  his  sides  and  came  back  to  the 
table. 

"What  does  he  want?"  asked  Floss,  appar 
ently  not  understanding  the  situation. 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT  233 

"To  make  a  speech,"  declared  De  Silva,  and 
gurgled  some  more. 

"Clown!  What  did  you  snub  him  for? 
Who  knows  what?  Possibly  State  Senator 
Plother'll  break  down  or  fall  in  a  faint 
Maybe  we'll  need  help " 

"From  that  bum?"  upspoke  The  Spiggoty 
in  scorn  and  derision.  "Do  you  know  what 
Tweed  is?  Broken-dowrn  shyster,  disbarred, 
thrown  out  of  every  club  in  New  York.  Why, 
for  twenty-five  dollars  he'd " 

A  knock  at  the  door. 

"Come  in !"  sang  out  the  Framms  in  unison. 

A  page  brought  in  an  envelope  on  a  silver 
tray.  It  was  a  sample  of  the  Merlinbilt's  best 
pearl-gray  stationery,  and  Floss  after  break 
ing  the  seal  smiled  faintly  and  handed  it  over 
to  her  husband.  It  was  scrawled  in  an  untidy, 
shaky  hand.  A  dissipated  rather  than  an  old 
hand,  he  would  have  said  had  he  been  any 
chirographer. 

"Distinguished  Sir:  Knowing  that  every 
ftioment  is  of  value  to  you  I  will  not  detain 
you  with  protestations.  But  probably  you  will 
recognize  my  name  and  see  in  me  one  who 
may  be  of  benefit  upon  this  occasion.  I  am 


234  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

ready  at  a  moment's  notice  to  deliver  a  speech 
of  any  length  and  upon  any  designated  topic. 
I  can  recite  from  the  poems  of  James  Whit- 
comb  Riley  or  my  own  humorous  composi 
tions.  I  have  a  repertoire  of  inimitable  anec 
dotes  and  my  eulogistic  themes  are  unexcelled. 
My  terms  are  reasonable.  Twenty-five  dollars 
for " 

Framm  tore  the  note  savagely  across  its 
impertinent  face  and  rushed  into  his  dressing 
room,  whither  Floss  patiently  followed  in  or 
der,  according  to  her  promise,  to  drape  him 
all  over  with  things. 

Chester  had  shaken  hands  all  round  in  the 
large  reception  room  outside  the  banquet  hall. 
Like  a  hero  already  established  in  public  life 
he  had  stood  next  to  Mr.  Justice  Haroran  and 
permitted  the  world  to  pay  him  tribute  at  five 
dollars  a  plate.  It  had  been  a  confusion  of 
pomp,  dressed  to  the  last  degree  of  splendor. 
Floss  in  a  coral  evening  gown,  glittering  with 
jewels,  had  looked  a  little  queen  and  thus 
far  had  behaved  with  dignity  in  keeping  with 
the  occasion.  .Fame  was  already  here.  The 
great  heart  of  Chester  A.  Framm  swelled  be- 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT  £35 

yond  the  confines  of  his  well-cut  shirt  front. 
He  heard  complimentary  voices  and  said  com 
plimentary  things.  He  forgot  what  he  said, 
but  it  was  much  and  meant  little.  His  one 
disagreeable  impression  was  that  of  a  slimy, 
puffy  creature  with  a  face  like  a  mushroom 
and  an  abominably  ornamental  shirt  who 
pumped  his  hand  and  introduced  himself  as 
J.  Fawcett  Tweed.  So  the  twenty-five-dollar 
Demosthenes  had  risked  his  five  on  a  chance. 

"Yes,  he  did!"  whispered  De  Silva,  when 
the  suggestion  was  made.  "He  grafted  his 
way  on  the  management." 

The  band  struck  up  a  patriotic  tune  and 
Chester,  ushered  in  by  another  door,  led  the 
grand  march  to  the  speakers'  table,  Mr.  Mc- 
Koncle,  president  of  the  Golden  Poppy  Socie 
ty,  lending  him  a  worshipful  arm.  The  vast 
roomful  of  guests  rose  as  to  royalty.  The 
band  was  blaring  mighty  music;  the  room 
was  hung  with  blue  and  gold.  Chester  all 
but  swooned  in  the  ecstasy  of  it. 

He  had  little  time  for  either  hope  or  fear 
during  that  mad,  glad  meal.  The  waiter 
poured  much  wine,  which  the  object  of  the 
testimonial  swallowed  nervously  and  at  fre 
quent  intervals.  The  president  of  the  Poppies, 


236  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

who  flanked  him  on  the  left,  and  Mr.  Justice 
Haroran,  who  hedged  him  in  on  the  right, 
were  in  a  bantering  mood.  Public  occasions 
were  nothing  to  them,  and  Chester  answered 
their  sallies  as  best  he  could,  wetting  his  dry 
lips  with  vintage  wine. 

Probably  Floss  was  right  when  she  had 
warned  that  the  more  he  said  his  speech  over 
the  worse  it  got.  At  a  prominent  table  right 
under  his  nose  he  could  see  the  witch,  who 
had  already  dropped  her  ceremonial  manner 
and  was  having  the  time  of  her  life  with  The 
Spiggoty.  The  chorus-girl  bride  sat  haughty 
and  cold  next  to  an  affable  little  fellow  who 
was  attempting  most  feverishly  to  break  the 
ice.  Why  had  Floss  arranged  this  great 
event  ?  Were  things  as  they  seemed  ?  Did  she 
actually,  by  a  freak  of  pride,  hope  to  launch 
him  publicly,  to  give  him  his  heart's  desire  in 
one  golden  evening? 

It  was  a  golden  evening  indeed.  Masses  of 
gold  centered  acres  of  tablecloths.  From  a 
giant  chandelier  in  the  center  of  the  room  fes 
toons  of  a  brilliant  yellow  something  drooped 
gracefully  to  the  galleries,  which  were  al 
ready  bright  with  pretty  domestics  in  Flossie's 
clothes.  Gold,  gold  everywhere.  Some  sort 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT  237 

of  flowers — the  thought  of  flowers  increased 
his  nervousness.  But  the  Supreme  Court  Jus 
tice  was  at  that  moment  telling  him  a  comic 
story  which  required  attention. 

At  last  the  president  of  the  Poppies  tinkled 
his  glass  for  silence  and  Chester  enjoyed  the 
wild  illusion  that  the  terrapin  he  had  eaten 
had  come  to  life  and  was  crawling,  shell  and 
all,  in  the  pit  of  his  stomach.  He  gulped 
another  glass  of  wine  just  as  the  toastmaster 
burst  into  his  song  of  praise.  Mr.  McKoncle 
drove  his  musical  chariot  up  the  western  rain 
bow  and  down  the  other  side.  The  white- 
tipped  peaks  of  the  Sierras  got  their  share, 
the  sun-kissed  missions  of  the  Padres  still 
more.  Mr.  McKoncle,  who  had  made  his  first 
million  building  new  old  missions  in  the  West, 
knew  what  he  was  talking  about  until  he  got 
on  the  subject  of  Col.  Chester  A.  Framm.  But 
even  on  that  unfamiliar  ground  he  knew  that 
Framm  had  endowed  the  University  of  Dyak 
until  it  "bade  fair,"  to  use  the  speaker's 
phrase,  "to  rival — nay,  outrival  any  similar 
institution  in  the  Western  Hemisphere." 

Chester  looked  down  at  Flossie.  She  had 
just  said  something  behind  her  hand  to  The 
Spiggoty.  Chester  sensed  trouble  in  the  air. 


238  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

He  seemed  to  smell  it.  The  tickling  at  the 
base  of  his  nose 

It  requires  a  long  time  for  a  man  to  be 
hanged,  when  you  take  everything  into  ac 
count.  Ceremonies  and  occasions  are  mostly 
designed  for  the  purpose  of  drawing  things 
out.  Chester's  upper  lip  was  beaded  with 
moisture,  yet  there  was  no  reason  in  the  world 
why,  being  an  intelligent  man,  he  should  not 
have  enjoyed  what  Judge  Haroran  said  about 
him.  The  judge,  it  seemed,  was  in  a  reminis 
cent  mood,  and  the  term  "pink  elephant "  was 
frequently  heard,  followed  by  laughter.  But 
Chester  was  deep  in  the  heights,  if  the  para 
dox  is  admissible.  The  judge's  anecdotes  went 
so  well  that  Chester  twice  made  up  his  mind 
to  begin  with  Floss'  quip  about  the  Subway. 
Twice  he  vetoed  it.  The  judge  finished,  after 
poking  two  or  three  jokes  at  himselj:  on  the 
subject  of  the  Patent  Medicine  Bill. 

State  Senator  Plother  proved  so  long- 
winded  that  the  guest  of  honor  had  about 
made  up  his  mind  that  the  meeting  would 
close  without  him  after  all.  The  state  senator 
was  mostly  worried  about  the  unjust  things 
that  had  been  said  against  Tammany  Hall. 
After  an  age  he  got  down  and  President 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT  239 

McKoncle  rose,  beaming  lovingly  upon  the 
evening's  martyr. 

And  at  that  moment  Chester  realized  what 
it  was  he  smelled.  There  it  lay,  just  beyond 
arm's  reach  opposite  his  plate — a  wonderful 
glowing  harrow  of  it,  a  foot  high  and  stretch 
ing  the  full  length  of  the  speakers'  table. 
Goldenrod ! 

"Waiter!"  he  hissed,  beckoning  to  some 
phantom. 

"Hst!"  warned  Justice  Haroran,  squeezing 
his  arm.  "The  toastmaster's  talking  about 
you." 

"That  goldenrod!"  the  miserable  wretch 
tried  to  explain. 

Haroran  merely  smiled,  the  activity  of  his 
two  white  mice  indicating  that  this  was  a 
strange  moment  for  the  admiration  of  botany. 

" and  like  all  great  men,  a  simple  char 
acter,"  McKoncle  was  raving  his  eulogium. 
"Despite  the  greatness  of  our  nation — which 
no  man  lives  so  base  as  to  deny — I  might  say 
that  from  California  has  come  the  finest  flow 
er  of  our  manhood.  Speaking  of  flowers, 
might  I  tell  briefly,  before  the  speaker  of  the 
evening  begins,  what  Mrs.  Framm  said  to  me 
only  last  week?  You  should  all  know  Mrs. 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


Framm,  that  charming,  sweet-voiced  helpmeet 
who  by  her  silent  counsel  and  soothing  wo 
man's  touch  has  blazed  the  way  to  success. 
We  were  conferring  in  the  matter  of  decora 
tions.  'The  decorations  must  be  blue  and 
gold/  I  said.  'Yes/  said  the  dear  little 
woman,  'but  it's  too  bad  we  can't  find  any 
poppies.  My  Chester  so  loves  the  poppy.' 
And  then  she  had  one  of  her  flashes  of  inspi 
ration.  'Goldenrod  !'  she  said." 

So  that  was  it!  Chester  leaned  far  over 
the  table  and  in  a  frenzy  attempted  to  poke 
the  yellow,  seedy,  sneeze-producing  bank  away 
with  his  fork.  It  was  just  beyond  the  tines. 
He  settled  back.  Perspiration  was  now  roll 
ing  from  his  forehead  down  to  his  collar.  The 
effort  was  superhuman. 

"  -  and  over  the  glorious  goldenrod  of  the 
East  the  man  who  has  so  well  honored  the 
poppy  of  the  West  will  rise  to  greet  you.  Col. 
Chester  A.  Framm." 

"He's  calling  on  you,"  whispered  Haroran's 
kindly  voice  in  his  ear. 

Chester  swam  to  his  feet.  His  eyes  were 
rapidly  filling  with  tears.  But  they  were 
neither  the  tears  of  patriotism  nor  of  remorse. 

"Ladies  and  gentlemen  of  the  Golden  Poppy 


ONE  GOLDEN  NIGHT 


Society/'  he  began  well  enough:  "It  is  with 
mingled  pain " 

His  watering  eyes  traveled  down  and  rested 
again  upon  that  bank  of  goldenrod. 

Ka-choo ! 

The  audience  sat  politely  still. 

"It  is  with  mingled  pain " 

Ka-choo !    Ka-choo !    Ka-choo ! 

"Will  somebody "  Choo!  " those 

damned  flowers  away !" 

And  Chester  sat  down,  volleying  as  he  sat. 


CHAPTER  XV 

KATZEN  J  AM  MER 

THE  Framms  got  through  the  week  follow 
ing  the  Golden  Poppy  Society's  banquet  less 
smoothly  than  was  their  wont.  Chester  stayed 
in  bed  several  days  and  Floss  nursed  him; 
nursed  him  like  the  heroic  little  gadfly  that  she 
was.  It  was  plain  to  see  that  she  was  sorry ; 
moreover,  there  was  never  a  nurse  who  could 
handle  his  hay  fever  as  Floss  could.  During 
those  sleepless  nights  his  most  endearing  word 
to  her  was  a  sneeze.  She  made  no  complaint. 
She  was  used  to  it.  In  silent  intervals  Chester 
turned  his  face  to  the  wall  and  asked  with 
increasing  bitterness  what  domestic  miracle 
had  kept  them  together  these  eccentric  years. 
Almost  from  the  first  their  match  had  been  as 
ill  assorted  as  that  of  a  lion  yoked  to  a  hum 
ming  bird.  He  saw  it  all  now;  and  as  he  saw 
it  he  sneezed  again.  A  wild  flame  had  burned 
between  them  in  their  early  days,  a  roseate 
vapor  which  had  thrown  all  things  out  of  their 

242 


KATZENJAMMER  243 

true  perspective ;  but  there  was  no  denying  the 
fact  that  they  were  growing  middle-aged  and 
mutually  critical.  Floss  had  played  him  once 
too  often. 

Then  she  would  come  in  wearing  something 
original,  alluring  and  young,  which  would 
have  the  effect  of  reversing  all  Chester's  opin 
ions.  Floss  was  not  middle-aged,  and  so  far 
as  he  could  calculate  she  never  would  be. 

However,  he  was  determined  that  he  would 
not  forgive  her  that  perfidious  cluster  of  gold- 
enrod.  The  very  memory  of  it  sent  him  into 
a  passion  of  sneezing.  He  seemed  to  have  lost 
all  interest  in  everything  else.  And  yet  the 
dinner  had  gone  off  wonderfully  well,  thanks 
to  the  big-hearted  deception  of  Judge  Haro- 
ran,  who  after  the  colonel's  first  nasal  volley 
had  come  to  his  feet  and  informed  the  ban 
queters  that  Colonel  Framm,  who  had  been 
threatened  with  Spanish  influenza,  had  risen 
from  a  sick  bed  to  attend  the  testimonial. 
Whereupon  the  Supreme  Court  Justice  had 
lifted  his  two  white  mice  and  his  roaring 
voice  in  a  remarkable  speech  setting  forth  im 
portant  views  on  the  Internationalization  of 
Inland  Waterways.  Chester  had  stuck  it  out, 


244  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

weeping  hay-feverishly  into  his  napkin,  then 
had  stolen  away  through  a  side  door. 

After  five  days  of  mourning,  sneezing,  in 
trospection  and  more  sneezing  Chester  got 
suddenly  better  and  decided  to  sit  up.  Flossie 
insisted  upon  swaddling  his  legs  in  a  blue 
steamer  rug,  but  his  convalescence  was  rapid 
and  he  was  able  to  show  his  teeth  when  she 
marched  demurely  in  with  a  sizable  bundle 
of  newspapers,  which,  sans  explanation,  she 
dumped  into  his  lap. 

"What  are  these?"  he  snarled. 

"What  do  you  think  they  are,  old  patch- — 
a  plate  of  oranges?  There,  Lamb  Pie,  I'll  tell, 
you  what  they  are:  Morning  of  October  nine 
teenth;  full  account  of  the  Framm  testimonial 
banquet.  You  haven't  seen  'em  yet.  Shall  I 
read  'em  to  my  Goob?" 

"Give  me  my  glasses/'  he  commanded  icily. 

And  sustained  by  the  lenses  he  was  able  to 
see  that  the  dinner  had  been,  from  a  stand 
point  of  publicity,  an  overwhelming  success. 

"Col.  Chester  A.  Framm  Stricken  With 
Influenza  at  Banquet"  was  a  favorite.  But 
none  so  brief  as  to  fail  in  describing  the 
magnificent  decorations,  the  list  of  distin 
guished  guests,  the  eloquence  of  President 


KATZENJAMMER 


McKoncle  and  the  epoch-making  importance 
of  Judge  Haroran's  second  speech.  The  por 
traits  of  Michael  Henry  Haroran  and  Chester 
A.  Framm  were  linked  together  on  many 
pages.  One  illustrated  supplement  gave  a 
flashlight  of  the  banquet.  Never,  perhaps,  in 
the  history  of  journalism  has  a  sneeze  been 
recorded  with  such  pomp  and  circumstance. 

"Now  look  here,  Floss,"  declared  her  hus 
band,  shoving  the  papers  off  to  the  floor,  "this 
is  all  very  well.  But  you  played  a  silly  vulgar 
practical  joke  on  me  at  a  time  in  my  life  when 
my  dignity  counted  for  everything.  You  hired 
the  biggest  hall  in  New  York  and  got  the 
greatest  list  of  names  in  America  —  for  what? 
For  the  satisfaction  of  giving  me  hay  fever." 

"God  gave  you  hay  fever,"  she  responded 
piously. 

"Bosh!  What  sort  of  a  mind  have  you? 
For  a  woman  of  your  age  -  " 

"I'm  not  a  woman  of  my  age!"  she  took  him 
up  sharply. 

"I  withdraw  that  statement,"  he  admitted. 
"But  you  do  talk  more  like  a  —  a  -  " 

"Flapper,"  she  prompted  him. 

"You  go  at  things  like  a  child  of  twelve,  not 
in  the  least  realizing  what  you're  meddling 


246  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

with.  The  sort  of  cheap  and  flashy  success 
you've  been  engineering  for  me  all  these  years 
has  given  you  an  unlimited  conceit " 

"Don't  you  talk  to  me  like  that!"  she  cried, 
showing  what  in  her  he  had  never  seen  all 
the  years  of  their  married  life.  They  had 
never  been  candid  enough  to  quarrel. 

She  had  brought  a  heel  of  her  frivolous 
slipper  down  crushingly  upon  the  carpet.  Her 
useless  little  hands  were  clenched,  as  was  the 
line  of  teeth,  which  showed  whitely  against 
the  angry  flush. 

"Floss — my  dear  girl — my  darling  child — " 

"I  married  you  out  of  a  steam  laundry!" 
she  lashed  out,  using  the  voice  of  another 
and  terrible  being.  "You  didn't  bring  me 
anything  but — love;  and  there  wasn't  a  rag 
of  pride  that  I  didn't  throw  to  the  dogs  to 
make  something  out  of  you — out  of  nothing. 
Conceit!  My  word — and  you  wanted  to  be 
an  orator!" 

"I'm  sorry,"  he  moaned.  But  she  was 
flouncing  out  of  the  room. 

He  struggled  to  rise  and  follow  her.  The 
feat  was  impossible  because,  as  it  turned  out, 
she  had  fastened  the  steamer  rug  round  him 
with  a  complicated  system  of  safety  pins. 


KATZENJAMMER  247 

He  lay  back  and  tried  to  consider  his  case. 
They  had  been  married  fifteen  years;  and  lo, 
and  behold!  here  was  an  entirely  new  and 
unknown  Floss. 

Comic  Relief  walked  in  at  that  moment,  the 
character  being  impersonated  by  Mr.  Ramon 
de  Silva.  Chester  could  hear  them  chatting 
quite  frothily  in  the  next  room ;  and  Chester's 
introspective  self  was  poisoned  by  the  thought 
which,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  was  voiced  by 
Floss  as  soon  as  she  came  into  his  presence, 
blithely  leading  The  Spiggoty. 

"Goober  and  I  are  thinking  of  getting  a 
divorce,"  she  announced  in  quite  her  regular 
manner.  "But  I  don't  know  how  'bout  it, 
Spig.  You're  the  only  other  man  I'd  endure 
as  a  husband.  And  you've  gone  and  spilled 
the  rice  by  marrying  Sissy." 

The  Spiggoty,  who  was  wearing  one  of  his 
robin's-egg-bluest  collars,  indicated  the  same 
spiritual  shade  as  he  fastened  his  somber  eyes 
upon  the  woman  to  whom,  as  Chester  always 
realized,  he  had  given  his  lifelong  devotion. 

"A  month  late!"  smiled  the  Spaniard. 
"Usually  you  arrange  things  better,  Floss." 

"Oh,  I  could  go  and  see  Sissy.     I  don't 


248  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

think  she  likes  you  any  better  than  you  do 
her." 

"Floss!"  In  spite  of  Chester's  vow  not  to 
speak  that  way  to  her  again  the  interjection 
seemed  necessary. 

"The  doctor,  madam,"  interposed  Floss' 
maid,  appearing  dramatically  at  the  door. 

"You  two  poor  dears  fix  it  up  to  suit  your 
selves,"  little  Mrs.  Framm  commanded,  and 
went  to  meet  Chester's  specialist. 

"Sit  down,"  commanded  Framm  desperate 
ly,  motioning  his  press  agent  to  the  nearest 
chair.  "Spig,  Floss  and  I  have  been  quarrel 
ing." 

"Why  shouldn't  you?"  asked  The  Spiggoty,. 
shrugging  his  worldly  shoulders.  "You're 
married,  aren't  you?" 

"But  this  is  different.  I've  known  you  bet 
ter  than  any  other  man  alive  these  fifteen 
years,  Spig,  and  I  can  be  forgiven  for  talking 
right  out.  Floss  and  I  have  never  talked  like 
this — we've  ragged  and  tagged,  but  it  has 
always  been  a  true-love  match — possibly  that's 
what's  the  matter  with  it.  Never  like  this 
before.  Why,  we  came  right  out  and  told  the 
truth." 


KATZENJAMMER  249 

"What  is  the  truth?"  asked  The  Spiggoty 
sadly  as  Pilate  might  have  done. 

"Floss  said  that  she  picked  me  out  of  the 
garbage  can  and  made  a  millionaire  out  of  me. 
That's  true.  I  said  that  in  doing  so  she  had 
wrecked  my  better  self  and  utterly  perverted 


me." 


"The  trouble  with  you,  Ches,  is  that  you're 
so  damned  young,"  was  The  Spiggoty's  sur 
prising  diagnosis. 

"Young!"  he  snorted.  "I'm  ages  older  than 
Floss." 

"No,  you're  not — nobody  is." 

"Huh!  At  any  rate  things  have  come  to  a 
crisis.  We've  got  to  separate." 

"As  bad  as  that?" 

"My  boyhood  ambition  was  to  study  law. 
With  Floss  round,  Blackstone  would  look  like 
a  dime  novel.  I'm  rich  enough  to  indulge  my 
tastes;  and  my  tastes  are  all  for  a  serious 
public  career  in  which  Floss  has  no  part. 
That's  the  case  in  a  nutshell." 

"I  see." 

The  Spiggoty  pondered.  It  was  rather  a 
fine  face  which  this  olive-skinned  Latin  had 
developed  in  his  early  middle  life.  Strange  to 
say,  there  was  a  certain  lingering  poetry  in 


250  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

it.  Here,  too,  was  possibly  a  story  of  per 
verted  ideals.  Floss  had  turned  him  from  a 
proud  Castilian  knight  into  a  superexcellent 
press  agent. 

"When  I'm  gone — out  of  her  life/'  the  sick 
man  enjoined  with  an  impetuous  rush  of  con 
fidence,  "I  want  you  to  look  after  her.  Floss 
has  got  something  like  genius;  but  like  most 
geniuses  she  couldn't  live  a  week  without  a 
business  manager.  I've  given  up  fifteen  valu 
able  years  to  that.  Now  I'm  determined  to 
resign — and  be  myself." 

"Ches,"  said  De  Silva  at  last  with  one  of 
his  dark  smiles,  "that's  a  splendid  program 
you've  blocked  out  for  yourself.  Splendid!" 

"Well,  what's  the  matter  with  it?" 

"It  lacks  the  one  thing  to  make  it  a  suc 


cess." 


"What's  that?" 

"Floss." 

"You  mean  I  can't  get  along  without  her?" 

"Well,  can  you?" 

Chester  A.  Framm  said  nothing  intelligible, 
but  started  to  cry.  This  may  be  forgiven  in 
a  man  who  was  at  once  ill,  tired  and  dis 
appointed. 

When  Floss  came  in  with  the  doctor  the 


KATZENJAMMER  251 

patient's  moisty  visage  could  be  easily  ac 
counted  for  as  glandular  irritation.  Doctor 
Sumner,  who  nicely  combined  the  social  and 
scientific  training  necessary  to  professional 
success,  went  over  the  nose  and  its  tributary 
canals  before  declaring  that  there  wasn't  much 
the  matter  with  the  colonel  any  more. 

"Now  I'm  going  to  recommend  a  treat 
ment,"  he  smiled,  "which  is  painless,  pleasant 
and  expensive.  No,  I'm  not  going  to  send 
you  to  Palm  Beach  or  Hot  Spings.  The  health 
resort  I  am  referring  to  is  right  round  the 
corner.  Broadway,  it's  called." 

"Broadway!"  snarled  the  patient,  who  had 
undoubtedly  reached  the  disagreeable  stage  of 
convalescence. 

"Mrs.  Framm  tells  me  that  you  have  been 
taking  life  much  too  seriously — all  work  and 
no  play.  Your  condition  is  a  nervous  one, 
brought  on  by  strain — no  relaxation.  Now  I 
may  be  thrown  out  of  the  profession  for  say 
ing  so,  but  in  my  opinion  Broadway  has  saved 
more  lives  than  it  has  wrecked.  The  only  way 
to  stop  a  worry  is  by  forgetting  it.  Two 
weeks  of  musical  comedy,  dancing " 

"I  don't  dance,"  objected  Chester,  who  had 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


always  regarded  Terpsichore  as  the  idiot  sis 
ter  among  the  muses. 

"You'll  have  fun  learning,"  said  Doctor 
Sumner.  "If  time  hangs  heavy  on  your  hands 
you  can  go  to  tea  dances  in  the  afternoons. 
Or  hire  a  phonograph  and  have  your  wife 
give  you  lessons  here  in  the  hotel." 

"I'll  die  first,"  he  groaned. 

"Chuck  Connors  used  to  say  that  he  could 
die  dancing,"  grinned  the  physician.  "I  am 
quite  serious  in  this,  colonel.  There's  nothing 
in  the  world  the  matter  with  you  now  but 
nervous  depression." 

It  was  queer,  but  Chester  at  that  moment 
entertained  a  vision  of  the  late  Aunt  Het  — 
so  strangely  like  Floss  —  who  had  killed  three 
successive  husbands  and  had  made  a  frivolous 
speech  from  her  death  bed. 

"I'll  turn  you  over  to  Mrs.  Framm,"  the 
doctor  was  going  on.  "I'm  sure  she  will  prove 
an  excellent  nurse  for  you.  You  don't  object 
to  dancing,  do  you,  Mrs.  Framm?"  Doctor 
Sumner  beamed. 

"I  know  a  few  steps,"  admitted  Floss. 

"The  little  devil,"  thought  her  disillusioned 
victim;  "if  she  had  paid  more  attention  to  her 


KATZENJAMMER  253 

head  and  less  to  her  heels  to-day's  estrange 
ment  had  never  come  to  pass." 

"I  would  suggest  that  the  treatment  begin 
at  once/'  urged  Doctor  Sumner,  taking  his 
hat  for  departure.  "If  you  will  telephone  me 
in  the  morning  at  about  twelve  and  let  me 
know " 

As  soon  as  he  was  gone  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Framm  and  Ramon  de  Silva  occupied  chairs 
in  triangular  formation  and  sat,  hands  folded, 
staring  into  the  vague.  For  the  first  time 
in  her  life  Floss  seemed  to  have  nothing  to 
say.  When  Chester  focused  his  weary  eyes 
upon  the  situation  he  observed  that  his  wife 
and  friend  were  regarding  him  earnestly  from 
their  equilateral  corners. 

"Floss/'  growled  her  husband,  "I'll  bet  you 
put  the  doctor  up  to  that  simple-minded 
Broadway  treatment." 

"There  he  goes  again !"  Floss  turned  to  The 
Spiggoty  as  a  witness.  "You  see,  nothing  ever 
happens  but  what  he  blames  it  on  me." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  BROADWAY  REST  CURE 

"WHAT  sort  of  a  rest-cure  sanitarium  have 
you  picked  out  for  to-night?" 

It  was  about  seven  o'clock  on  the  evening 
of  the  same  day,  and  the  Framms  were  busily 
engaged  in  arraying  themselves  as  for  a  great 
occasion.  Strange  as  it  may  seem,  Chester, 
whose  lawn  tie  was  at  that  moment  being 
folded  by  his  skillful  Japanese,  appeared  to 
be  anything  but  an  invalid.  This,  perhaps, 
was  due  to  the  whimsicality  of  nervous  dis 
eases. 

"Esther,"  said  Floss  to  the  maid,  who  was 
hooking  her  up,  "please  be  careful  and  tuck 
those  ribbons  down  in  the  back.  Last  time 
you  left  them  hanging  out  and  I  had  to  bribe 
the  waiter  to " 

"Florabel,"  persisted  her  husband,  striding 
sternly  to  the  door,  "I  asked  you  a  question." 

"Uh-huh."  He  could  see  her  rosy  reflec 
tion  beaming  at  him  from  the  mirror.  "The 

254 


THE  BROADWAY  REST  CURE    255 

place  we  are  going?  It's  a  joint.  They  call 
it  Hannigan's  Bedlam  Cabaret." 

"Where  do  you  learn  about  all  those  vicious 
places  ?" 

"Don't  give  me  all  the  credit.  It's  the 
Macawbers'  party — I  got  old  Hector  on  the 
phone  and  he  declared  that  The  Bedlam  is 
the  place  where  the  dissipated  people  go. 
They've  asked  the  Phil  Jasons,  and,  of  course, 
I  coaxed  them  to  include  The  Spiggoty  and 
his  dippy  bride.  It's  one  of  those  places 
where  everybody  pulls  the  tablecloth  off  after 
twelve  and  you  can  do  the  dance  of  the  seven 
napkins  without  being  thrown  out." 

"I  think  Doctor  Sumner's  a  quack/'  grum 
bled  Chester,  about  to  turn  back  toward  his 
own  dressing  room. 

"Chet,  dear,"  she  called  after  him,  her 
Angel  Bloom  complexion  adding  charm  to  the 
mirrored  visage  he  saw  and  worshiped  in  spite 
of  himself,  "I've  been  wondering  something 
about  you  ever  since  that  Golden  Poppy  night. 
If  you  made  a  speech  what  would  you  talk 
about?" 

"Huh.    You  wouldn't  be  interested." 

"You're  horrid!"    The  reflection  sulked. 

"Why  should  you  be  interested?" 


256  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

"I  always  did  adore  mental  diseases.  When 
my  Uncle  Dab  Fuller  went  crazy  and  thought 
he  was  Cleopatra " 

"If  that's  the  sort  of  thing  you  like  you'll 
like  that  sort  of  thing." 

He  turned  and  took  his  empurpled  visage  to 
his  own  mirror.  He  pretended  he  didn't  see 
her  lovely  reflection  standing  coaxingly  behind 
his  a  moment  later;  pretended  to  ignore  the 
girlish  slenderness  of  her  white  arms  and  the 
smooth,  spirited  little  neck  as  pearly  as  the 
gems  that  encircled  it.  She  had  to  reach  up 
to  draw  his  face  round  toward  hers. 

"Now  tell  me,  Old  Brutal!  What  sort  of  a 
grand  speech  would  it  prefer  to  make?" 

"With  you  round  jeering  at  me?" 

"Suppose  I  was  dead  and — and  you'd  mar 
ried  Carlotta.  What  would  you  talk  about 
to  all  the  Romans  and  citizens  and  great  big 
intellectual  brains  assembled  to  give  ear?" 

"About  fifteen  minutes." 

This  was  pretty  good  for  Chester,  who  was 
not  a  born  humorist. 

"I  know.  But  you'd  have  to  have  a  subject. 
Even  Chauncey  M.  Depew  and  Job  Hedges 
have  to  have  those  things." 


THE  BROADWAY  REST  CURE    257 

He  pretended  not  to  hear  and  went  on 
smoothing  the  lapels  of  his  evening  coat. 

"What — besides  fifteen  minutes — were  you 
going  to  talk  about  at  the  Golden  Poppies?" 

"Really  in  earnest  ?" 

"Horribly." 

"I've  told  you  often  enough — the  Secret  of 
Success." 

"My  word!" 

"There  you  go  again." 

"'Tm  sorry,  Chet.  But  do  you  mean  to  say 
you  intended  to  stand  up  before  all  those 
people  and  give  our  snap  away?" 

"What  snap,  if  you  please?" 

"How  we  came  to  make  Angel  Bloom — 
grandmother's  recipe  for  rouge?" 

"Who  ever  mentioned  rouge?  The  trouble 
with  most  women  is  that  they  have  to  see 
everything  in  a  personal  light.  Men — serious 
men — aren't  interested  in  such  matters." 

"What  would  make  the  big  intellectual 
brains  sit  up  and  clap  their  strong  manly 
hands?" 

Chester  walked  a  pace  away  from  his  Flos 
sie  and  stood  regarding  the  frail  skill  with 
which  she  clasped  a  bracelet  round  her  wrist. 

"How  would  you  go  at  the  Secret  of  Sue- 


258  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

cess?"  she  persisted,  cocking  her  head  to  one 
side. 

"Well,  I'd  dwell  on  character — the  forma 
tion  of  character — how  the  struggles  of  youth 
against  obstacles  develop  the  qualities  of  lead 
ership " 

"Some  quotations  from  Tennyson  and  Mar 
cus  Aurelius?" 

"Milton  and  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes,"  he 
corrected  her. 

"Then  there's  Abraham  Lincoln  and  the 
pine-knot  fire." 

"See  here,  Floss,"  he  broke  out,  "you  must 
have  been  reading  my  notes." 

"All  your  life,"  she  smiled. 

Then  giving  him  a  long  and  serious  gaze 
she  volunteered  in  a  voice  which  was  stranger 
than  her  look:  "Great  Scott!" 

"Thinking  you  could  do  better,  I  suppose?" 

"No,  I  wasn't  thinking  that.  I — I  was  sort 
of  thinking  how  I'd  like  to  hear  you  make  a 
speech — if  you  were  anybody's  husband  but 


mine." 


The  Hector  Macawbers,  who  were  very 
rich  beneficiaries  of  the  perfumery  trust,  usu 
ally  dined  in  splendor  at  home,  the  colonel 


THE  BROADWAY  REST  CURE    259 

moodily  reflected  as  he  sat  beside  Flossie  in 
a  taxicab  that  bumped  them  toward  Bedlam. 

"Aren't  the  Macawbers  keeping  house  any 
more?"  he  asked  with  a  sigh. 

"We  didn't  come  to  New  York  to  sit  round 
a  stuffy  old  plush  house,"  she  told  him.  "You 
know  what  the  doctor  ordered.  Hector  and  I 
picked  out  Bedlam  this  afternoon  over  the 
telephone.  It's  noisy  and  low — full  of  broken- 
down  actors  and  lovely  wretches.  We  can 
dance  our  heads  off." 

"That'll  be  nice,"  agreed  the  danceless  hus^ 
band. 

They  found  the  Macawbers  and  their  party* 
waking  for  them  in  the  noisy  little  lobby  by 
the  Bedlam's  elevator.  Young  banditti  in 
pinkish  uniforms  were  busily  robbing  people 
of  their  coats  and  hats;  the  sign  Evening 
Dress  Obligatory  was  prominently  hung  over 
the  cloakroom  door,  from  which  a  profane 
stranger  in  a  brown  business  suit  was  being 
ejected 

Mr.  Hector  Macawber  was  an  overfed  gen 
tleman  of  fisfty-five,  whose  slender  waistline 
and  bulging  sides  hinted  that  he  wore  corsets. 
Mrs.  Macawber  was  a  frilly  person  with  silver 
slippers  and  snow-white  hair.  Phil  Jason,  also 


260  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

i^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^\^^^^^^m^^^m^*^^m^mm"mi^^^m^^^^mm^'m^r*m^^ 

of  the  perfumery  trust,  was  a  neatly  groomed, 
close-cropped  little  man  who  suggested  the 
commuting  church  member  come  to  New 
York  for  a  good  time.  As  a  matter  of  record 
he  was  born  in  lower  Fifth  Avenue,  had  been 
twice  divorced,  and  the  stout  but  still  beauti 
ful  woman  at  his  side  was  an  ex-choir  singer 
who  had  got  her  name  in  the  papers  as  the 
third  Mrs.  Jason. 

There  was  a  clatter  of  welcome. 

"What  a  fascinating,  queer  place.  I  am 
thrilled/'  protested  Mrs.  Macawber  as  they 
were  going  up  in  the  elevator. 

"Flossie  just  would  come  here.  I  suggested 
the  Insomnia  Roof  and  the  Nightmare  Gar 
dens — but  she  insisted  that  Chester  had  to 
have  excitement."  Macawber  winked  over  at 
Framm. 

"I've  been  having  the  most  awful  time  with 
him,"  confessed  Flossie. 

"What  can  you  expect?"  Old  Macawber 
looked  ever  so  wise.  "Husband,  New  York — 
puff.  He's  off!" 

"They're  dreadful,"  sympathized  Mrs.  Jason 
in  her  languid  contralto. 

"Heck's  going  in  for  Bicardi  rum  this 
week,"  proclaimed  Mrs.  Macawber.  "It  makes 


THE  BROADWAY  REST  CURE    261 

him  very  loud.  What  vice  has  yours  taken 
up?" 

This  last  was  put  to  Florabel. 

"Public  speaking,"  announced  Chester's 
little  secret  of  eternal  youth. 

"Public  speaking!"  echoed  the  elevator. 

"We  have  with  us  to-night  Col.  Chester  A. 
Framm,  citizen,  patriot  and  man,"  spouted 
Jason.  "Got  the  habit,  I  suppose,  the  night 
you  sneezed  your  way  into  the  Hall  of  Fame?" 

"Shut  up !"  commanded  Flossie. 

Framm,  who  was  blushing  like  a  schoolboy, 
began  to  stutter,  "It  hasn't — come  on  yet.  You 
see,  my  wife " 

"Proud  of  you?"  wheezed  Macawber. 
"Quite  naturally.  Who  ever  heard  of  a 
colonel  who  wasn't  an  orator?" 

The  old  beau  stood  staring  pop-eyed. 

"What's  the  matter  now?  Going  to  have  a 
fit  right  here  between  floors?"  asked  Jason  in 
counterfeit  alarm. 

"An  in-spi-ra-tion !" 

He  opened  his  mouth,  displaying  a  suspi 
ciously  even  row  of  teeth,  and  would  have 
spoken  further  had  not  the  door  opened  upon 
the  African  din  of  New  York's  most  frantic 
nightmare  dining  room.  The  walls  were  done 


262  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

in  violent  vegetable  designs  with  restless  mon 
strosities  capering  across  the  panels.  Over  the 
ceiling  stretched  an  awning  of  wild  stripes. 
More  or  less  presentable  young  women  in  the 
costume  of  Pierrot  strolled  between  the  over 
flowing  tables,  passing  srfiall  cards  with  the 
announcement : 

A  NIGHT  IN  LOVELAND 

AND 

FEAST  OF  AFTER-DINNER  WISDOM 

J  FAWCETT  TWEED 

CELEBRATED  RACONTEUR  AND  PRINCE  OF 
BOHEMIA  AS 

HOST  OF  THE  EVENING 
WELCOMES  You  ALL 

Chester  Framm  had  read  the  card  twice 
before  he  looked  over  and  saw  the  grin  on 
Macawber's  faee. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

A  PALE  GHOST  AND  A  SOLID  TRUTH 

"BY  GEORGE,  Chet,"  cried  the  merry  old 
blade,  "here's  your  chance !  There's  the  speak 
er's  table  all  set  and  ready  for  yo.u." 

Framm  frowned  at  his  wife,  and  heartened 
by  her  averted  gaze  he  decided  that  the  Ma- 
cawber  style  of  wit  was  poor  and  nothing 
more.  The  table  to  which  he  referred  was  a 
large  one,  elaborately  set  with  a  dozen  places 
and  standing  on  a  raised  dais  at  the  end  of 
the  room. 

"What's  the  idea  ?"  he  asked,  again  puzzling 
over  the  card  as  he  took  his  seat  at  their  own 
table. 

"Abe  Hannigan,  who  runs  this  place,  got 
the  notion  that  he  could  conduct  a  continu 
ous  banquet  here  every  night.  So  he's  hired 
a  gang  of  professional  banqueters  to  sit  at 
the  host's  table  and  a  broken-down  spellbinder 
to  act  as  host  of  honor.  But  I  didn't  know 

263 


264  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

J.  Fawcett  Tweed  had  got  this  low/'  explained 
Jason,  eying  the  empty  head  table. 

"And  who's  this  J.  Fawcett  Tweed?" 

"You've  lived  away  from  Broadway,"  was 
Jason's  commiserating  hint. 

"Tweed  isn't  the  man  he  used  to  be,  nor 
never  was,"  cut  in  Macawber.  "He  was  one 
of  your  ballyhoo  lawyers  with  a  silver  tongue 
and  a  leaden  brain  until  the  state  disbarred 
him  for  engineering  a  fake-condemnation  pro 
ceedings  in  the  Bronx.  Then  he  decided  to 
become  a  prince  of  good  fellows — you  know 
the  type — recklessly  generous  with  other  peo 
ple's  wine." 

"He  was  quite  sought  after  for  a  while," 
chimed  Mrs.  Macawber. 

"He  is  now — by  the  subpoena  man." 

"You  remember  him,"  said  the  Spiggoty  to 
Chester — "He  tried  to  butt  in  at  your  ban 
quet." 

"I  hope  you'll  like  my  party,"  remarked  old 
Hector  to  Mrs.  Framm,  but  that  lady's  eyes 
were  all  for  the  head  table. 

There  was  something  ghastly  about  that 
head  table.  It  conveyed  the  same  sense  of 
sacrilege  which  religious  rites,  funerals  or 
weddings  often  do  in  stage  productions.  Bright 


A  PALE  GHOST 265 

with  glassware  and  flowers — artificial  flow 
ers  probably — the  whole  laden  board  awaited 
its  mock  revelers.  The  effect  was  depressing. 
The  table  had  been  set  in  such  a  way  that  the 
imitation  guests  could  face  their  audience  as 
they  do  in  stage  banquets.  Broadway  had 
never  thought  of  anything  more  mawkish 
than  this  scene. 

The  band  blared.  Out  of  the  nowhere 
those  puppet  guests  came  trooping — a  miser 
able  painted  crew,  as  Framm  could  see  from 
his  not  distant  seat.  Weirdly  enameled  wom 
en  and  queer  feeble  men — they  sauntered  self 
consciously  two  by  two  and  stood  expectantly 
by  their  chairs.  Then  came  a  salvo  from 
orchestral  trumpets.  A  puffy  little  fellow 
with  the  face  of  a  diseased  mushroom  stood 
at  center  plate  and  spread  a  mechanical  smile. 
The  appearance  of  J.  Fawcett  Tweed  brought 
some  applause,  also  catcalls. 

"I  thank  you,  fellow  Bo-he-mi-ans,"  came  a 
sonorous  whisky-laden  voice.  "Let  the  revels 
begin/' 

The  poorly  paid  revelers  at  the  main  table 
were  seated  accordingly,  and  Tweed  was  seen 
to  turn  his  stupid,  self-indulgent  old  smile 
toward  the  painted  lady  at  his  left.  A  stage 


266  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

butler  poured  wine — it  was  easy  to  imagine 
that  ginger  ale  gurgled  from  the  tin-foiled 
neck  of  the  bottle,  and  by  Tweed's  meager 
occasional  sips  one  might  quite  safely  say 
that  such  was  the  case. 

"You  don't  mean  to  say  he  does  it  every 
evening  for  money?"  Framm  found  himself 
asking,  with  both  pity  and  marvel. 

"Money  and  the  drinks,"  grinned  Macaw- 
ber.  "But  Hannigan's  foxy — J.  Fawcett 
doesn't  get  a  real  drink  until  the  party's  over." 

"He's  never  asked  anywhere  any  more," 
came  Mrs.  Jason's  rich  contralto. 

"He  made  a  pretty  fair  speech  back  in 
1910,"  explained  Macawber. 

"He  never  was  any  good,"  objected  Jast>n. 
"I  wonder  who  ever  told  him  he  could  make 
a  speech?" 

These  comments  were  distributed  over  sev 
eral  courses  of  food  which  was  a  degree  bet 
ter  than  Bohemian  and  several  degrees  worse 
than  good.  At  the  table  of  honor  the  imita 
tion  ladies  and  gentlemen  were  hanging  on  the 
words  of  J.  Fawcett  Tweed;  now  and  then 
they  wquld  burst  into  a  gale  of  laughter — a 
gale  so  nicely  timed  as  to  suggest  the  pressing 
of  a  button  at  proper  intervals.  Chester  dur- 


rA  PALE  GHOST 267 

ing  a  break  in  his  morbid  contemplation  found 
his  Flossie  whispering  intimately  with  the  cap 
tain  of  waiters,  who  wore  a  worldly  smile  and 
glanced  now  and  then  toward  the  host  of 
honor. 

"I'm  getting  his  biography/*  she  explained 
when  her  husband  caught  her  eye.  "It  seems 
he  is  just  playing  here  for  the  week.  Last 
week  they  had  a  Hindu  juggler,  and  next  to 
come  will  be  a  troupe  of  trained  dogs.  The 
waiter  says  that  the  people  like  the  dogs  best." 

"Heck,  why  did  you  choose  this  dreary 
place?"  asked  Mrs.  Heck  by  way  of  whole 
some  cheer. 

"Ask  Flossie,"  he  defended  weakly.  "She's 
brought  Chet  to  study — and  of  course  he's 
got  to  make  his  usual  appearance  to-night." 

"You  just  let  my  Goober  alone !"  demanded 
Flossie;  and  her  tone  wasn't  all  banter. 

"Come  on — give  us  an  oration — be  a  good 
chap !"  Jason  put  in  his  oar. 

"My  wife  won't  let  me,"  protested  the 
blushing  slave  of  ambition. 

"Go  ahead,"  said  Flossie  kindly.  "It's  so 
noisy  here  I'm  sure  nobody  ever  listens  to  any 
body." 

The  sharp  woody  tat-tat  of  a  gavel  punctu- 


268  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

j^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^***"*^"^^™*'?^'*'''^"'*™^ 

ated  Bedlam.  The  band  blared,  the  drums 
ruffled.  Right  and  left  little  hissing  sounds 
besought  silence;  for  J.  Fawcett  Tweed  was 
standing  by  his  chair  on  the  dais.  Leaning 
slightly  forward,  his  fat  fingers  braced  against 
the  tablecloth,  his  swollen  old  face  distributed 
its  lifeless  smile  right  and  left. 

"Dear  brothers  and  sisters  in  Loveland — or 
shall  I  say — true  affinities  in  the  Land  of 
Love  and  Laughter? 

"We  welcome  you  here  in  the  name  of  the 
divine  electric  spark  which  leaps  from  breast 
to  breast  in  that  chosen  realm  where  respon 
sibility  is  unknown,  where  care  is  as  nought 
and  joy  is  unconfined." 

"Poor  wretch!"  insisted  Mrs.  Macawber, 
who  apparently  was  one  of  your  rich  women 
who  love  to  indulge  in  pity. 

"In  Bo-he-mi-a,"  thus  the  husky  voice  rolled 
it  forth  like  the  blast  from  a  distillery,  "there 
is  no  such  word  as  slave.  We  are  all  kings 
and — pardon  me,  ladies — queens  together. 
Here  the  millionaire  hobnobs  with  the  clerk, 
poverty  sits  cheek  by  jowl  with  riches.  There 
is  no  gold  here" — he  turned  to  frown  at  a 
waiter  who  was  quarreling  over  his  tip — "no 
gold  here,  save  the  true  gold  of  mind  and 


A  PALE  GHOST  269 

heart.  Here,  amid  the  bubble  of  wine  and 
the  laughter  of  bright  eyes,  we  may  pledge 
the  toast" — ecstatically  lifting  a  hollow- 
stemmed  glass  of  ginger  ale:  "Here's  to  me, 
as  bad  as  I  am,  and  to  you,  as  good  as  you. 
are.  For  as  bad  as  I  am  and  as  good  as  you 
are  I'm  as  good  as  you  are  as  bad  as  I  am." 

"Phew  I"  whispered  Jason.  "That  joke  was 
chloroformed  when  I  was  a  freshman." 

"1891,"  agreed  Macawber. 

"As  bright  as  I  am  as  punk  as  he  is,"  para 
phrased  Jason.  "I'm  glad  Flossie  insisted  on 
our  coming." 

Col.  Chester  A.  Framm,  however,  was  only 
aware  of  the  applause  which  followed  the  af 
ter-dinner  bathos.  He  was  ashamed  of  the 
envious  thrill  along  his  spine. 

"In  the  flower-laden  court  of  Bo-he-mi-a," 
the  prince  of  good  fellows  went  rolling  on, 
"all  men  are  poets,  for  who  so  dull  as  not  to 
sing  when  the  rarest  flowers  of  thought  are 
strewn  with  a  prodigal  hand " 

"Get  the  hook!" 

This  comment,  which  the  colonel  rather  re 
sented,  came  from  a  rat- faced  little  fellow  who 
sat  beside  a  milk-white  blonde  at  the  table  just 
behind  him.  The  blonde  replied:  "Shut  up] 


270  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

He  ain't  an  amachewer."  Which  raised  her 
in  the  colonel's  regard. 

His  wistful  eyes  were  again  on  the  profes 
sional  speaker,  and  when  he  turned  and 
looked  over  at  his  wife  he  caught  her  studying 
him  with  the  amused  affectionate  expression 
she  often  held  for  him.  He  turned  sullenly 
away.  Awful  example  of  misspent  ambition 
that  this  Tweed  might  be — and  Framm  had 
no  intention  of  trading  lives  with  him — yet  he 
possessed  the  thing  which  Framm  had  always 
wanted  to  cultivate  in  himself — stage  pres 
ence.  What  though  his  phrases  were  empty  as 
sucked  eggs,  his  condition  a  mockery  among 
his  fellow  men?  In  spite  of  that  he  could 
stand  alone,  the  observed  of  an  audience;  and 
in  the  last  analysis  their  jeers  were  drowned 
in  the  general  applause. 

Every  evening  he  could  feel  that  ego-satis 
faction  which  Chester  A.  Framm  had  known 
but  once — on  that  mad,  glad  prize-winning 
night  when  Carlotta  Beam  had  shown  him  the 
first  step  on  the  road  to  greatness. 

He  got  another  glimpse  of  Flossie.  She  was 
taking  in  the  speaker's  table  with  all  the  sar 
castic  brilliance  of  her  eyes. 

The  colonel  was  brought  back  to  his  sur- 


A  PALE  GHOST  271 

roundings  suddenly,  shockingly,  as  by  a  dash 
of  cold  water.  Somebody  was  shouting  his 
name  through  the  room: 

"Col.  Chester  A.  Framm!" 

That  horrifically  personal  address  was  be 
ing  roared  from  the  speaker's  table ;  moreover 
it  was  J.  Fawcett  Tweed  who  was  roaring  it, 
his  shapeless  mouth  wide  open,  his  fat  right 
hand  generously  extended. 

" and  again  I  repeat  that  name,  Col. 

Chester  A.  Framm,  a  name  which  is  doubly 
blessed  in  every  well-equipped  boudoir 
throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  land. 
Let  us  hail  the  Cosmetic  King!  Need  I  say 
that  we  are  proud  to  have  him  with  us  to 
night  ?  And  yet  it  is  not  unusual  in  the  court 
of  Bo-he-mi-a  for  princes  of  commerce  to 
come  and  make  merry  with  struggling  poets 
and — and  workers  in  the  busy  marts  of  trade; 
for  in  the  realm  of  flowers  is  not  the  prim 
rose  the  equal  of  the  American  Beauty?  It 
is  an  unusual  treat  which  we  all  have  in  store 
-. — to  hear  a  few  remarks  from  the  American 

Beauty "  It  was  not  till  now  that  full 

realization  of  his  danger  came  upon  Chester 
Framm.  His  tongue  seemed  to  have  turned  to 
chalk. 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


"  -  the  American  Beauty  who  has  done 
more  to  perpetuate  American  beauty  —  I 
mean  the  ladies,  God  bless  'em  —  than  any 
other  citizen  of  our  great  republic.  Beauty, 
they  say,  is  only  skin  deep;  yet  by  the  skin 
we  are  able  to  tell  a  peach  from  a  potato. 
But  let  not  my  own  poor  words  detain  you  all 
from  a  feast  of  good  things.  Ladies  and  gen 
tlemen,  Col.  Chester  A.  Framm  will  honor  us 
with  a  few  words  on  -  " 

He  paused  and  seemed  to  consult  his  notes. 

"  -  on  The  Secret  of  Success." 

The  room  grew  black  before  Framm's  eyes. 
In  the  haze  Macawber's  face  seemed  to  have 
grown  purple  and  Mrs.  Macawber's  to  have 
taken  on  her  favorite  look  of  plutocratic  pity. 
He  tried  to  shoot  an  angry  glance  at  Flossie, 
but  the  muscles  of  his  face  were  out  of  order. 

"Get  up,  you  goose!"  he  heard  her  com 
manding. 

He  staggered  to  his  feet  amidst  an  ava 
lanche  of  hand-clapping  and  an  earthquake  of 
bang-banging  sounds  —  the  latter  being  pro 
duced  by  means  of  little  wooden  spoons  which 
the  management  had  provided  as  ready  noise 
makers.  All  the  world  was  looking  at  him  with 
the  same  vacant  stare  —  he  now  knew  how  the 


A  PALE  GHOST  273 

mob  must  look  to  the  man  inside  the  noose. 
From  the  head  table  the  impossible  Mr. 
Tweed  smirked  like  some  cruel  idol.  Framm 
stood  a  tortured  moment  before  he  performed 
his  supreme  act  of  self-sacrifice. 

"Ladies  and  gentlemen,"  he  said  quietly,  "I 
am  no  talker.  But  I  thank  you  nevertheless." 

And  he  sat  down. 

It  was  brief,  inglorious  and  surprising  even 
to  Chester.  But  what  immediately  followed 
was  in  the  realm  of  miracles.  For  the  heavy 
contact  with  his  chair  seemed  to  have  touched 
some  synchronic  spring  across  the  table,  a 
spring  which  caused  a  little  woman  to  leap  to 
her  feet,  snapping  quick  golden  fires  from  her 
eyes  as  she  challenged  the  whole  room. 

"Ladies  and  gentlemen,"  he  heard  Flossie's 
chirping,  clear,  rather  nasal  challenge.  "I'm 
Mrs.  Framm.  There's  a  speech  that's  been 
bottled  up  in  this  family  for  about  sixteen 
years,  and  because  my  husband  has  been  too 
busy  with  real  work  to  fool  with  dissipation 
that  bottle's  never  been  opened.  I  will  now 
proceed  to  uncork  it.  The  label  on  that 
speech,  I  believe,  is  The  Secret  of  Success. 
Well,  here  goes. 

"I  don't  know  anything  about  great  big 


374  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

grand  successes  like  Napoleon.  The  only 
work  of  genius  I've  ever  had  a  chance  to 
watch  is  my  Chester  building  up  the  cosmetic 
business.  If  you  want  to  hear  about  him " 

Cries  of  "Hear!    Hear!" 

"Well,  now,  friends,  this  is  his  secret  of 
success.  He's  got  there  by  three  things: 
Finding  something  the  people  wanted,  giving 
it  to  them,  and  keeping  his  mouth  shut.  Ches 
ter  never  advertises  himself;  he  lets  other  fel 
lows  do  it  for  him.  Did  you  ever  notice  that 
the  fellow  who  blows  the  horn  never  conducts 
the  orchestra?  That's  Chester's  philosophy. 
There  may  be  something  fine  about  being  a 
great  oratorical  statesman,  like  Noah  Web 
ster.  I  don't  know,  because  I  never  read  his 
tory  books.  But  what  I  do  know  is  this :  My 
Chester  is  just  as  big  a  hit  as  I  want,  and 
just  the  kind  of  hit  I'm  looking  for.  Sixteen 
years  ago  he  started  in  by  trying  to  interest 
a  corner  druggist  in  a  dozen  jars  of  home 
made  rouge.  This  week  the  shipments  o'f 
Framm's  Complexion  Preparations  through 
out  the  United  States,  Great  Britain  and  the 
Colonies,  if  carried  in  a  single  train  of  box 
cars  would  extend  twice  round  Manhattan 


A  PALE  GHOST  215 

Island  and  stick  the  end  of  its  tail  out  be 
yond  Yonkers. 

"If  Chester's  got  to  be  bragged  about  I'm 
the  one  that  should  do  it,  because  I'm  his  wife. 
At  the  age  of  twenty-three  he  started  in  to  be 
a  great  statesman  and  fizzled  out  after  one 
performance.  At  the  age  of  forty-one  he's 
lost  the  power  of  speech,  but  he's  the  man  who 
puts  complexion  cream  on  the  face  of  the 
globe.  And  that's  the  secret  of  success — if 
you  know  what  I  mean.  I'd  rather  be  boss  in 
a  glue  works  than  a  cockroach  in  the  Hall  of 
Fame.  The  thing  to  do  is  to  find  out  what 
you're  good  at,  then  do  it;  and  if  you  can't 
find  out  for  yourself  find  somebody  who  can." 

She  sat  down  in  the  hush  before  the  cloud 
burst.  Mr.  Hannigan  was  the  only  complain 
ant  that  night  because,  as  he  told  the  head 
waiter :  "Enthusiasm's  fine  for  the  place — but 
who  pays  for  the  breakage?"  The  Macawber 
table  became  the  focal  point  for  one  of  those 
distressingly  cordial  affairs  known  as  getting 
acquainted  with  New  York.  They  would  have 
borne  Flossie  triumphantly  on  their  shoulders 
had  they  dared  and  had  not  Colonel  Framm, 
now  master  of  his  dignity,  prevented. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  Chester  would  have  ap- 


276  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

proved  had  not  his  egotism  smarted  with  one 
of  those  vanity  wounds  which  an  actor  feels 
when  he  finds  that  his  poor  little  wife  is  be 
coming  billed  as  a  prima  donna.  The  for 
malities  ceased  in  a  general  clatter  during 
which  Mr.  Hannigan  saw  to  it  that  breakage 
was  made  golden  for  him  in  extra  wine  or 
ders.  The  jazz  began  its  harmonic  convul 
sions,  the  floor  cleared  for  dancing. 

"I'm  crazy  to  jazz!''  cried  Flossie,  and  al 
most  on  the  confession  found  herself  whirling 
away  against  the  broad  shirt  front  of  Hector 
Macawber.  Her  husband,  still  deep  in  his 
coma,  sat  facing  a  newly  opened  bottle  of 
wine. 

"Ah,  Colonel  Framm!" 

A  champagne-thickened,  fusil-oily  voice* 
spoke  close  to  his  shoulder.  Looking  round 
Framm  descried  the  bulbous  face  of  the  host 
of  honor. 

"Mr.  Tweed?    How  do  you  do." 

The  colonel  found  himself  pump  handling 
the  pretentious  hand  of  the  pretentious  little 
fellow.  Tweed's  air  had  changed  from  one  of 
lofty  inspiration  to  one  of  cringing  servility. 

"It's  a  great  honor  to  us,"  he  insisted,  quite 
ignoring  the  passion  with  which  so  recently 


A  PALE  GHOST 277 

4 

he  had  eulogized  Bohemia's  democratic  ten 
dencies.  "A  great  honor  to  have  one  of  your 
— er — importance  in  our  midst.  It  gives  tone 
to  the  place."  His  eyes  were  wandering  to 
ward  the  champagne  bottle.  "I  have  often 
thought  it  would  be  a  good  plan  to  organize 
a  little  club  restaurant  where  the  better  classes 
— our  sort  of  people,  you  know — could  for 
gather  and  exchange  ideas." 

"Upper-class  Bohemia?"  asked  the  colonel 
with  a  sarcasm  unusual  to  him. 

"Exactly."  The  small  watery  eyes  were 
now  resting  so  lovingly  upon  the  bottle  that 
Framm  could  not  unheed  the  hint. 

"Waiter,  bring  a  glass  for  Mr.  Tweed." 

The  waiter,  who  was  a  magician,  produced 
a  glass  out  of  nowhere,  and  the  orator  scarcely 
lingering  to  wish  the  colonel's  very  good 
health  drained  it  at  a  gulp. 

"Excellent!"  He  smacked  his  thick  lips. 
"You  never  can  tell  about  a  wine " 

"Until  it's  uncorked?" 

"A  splendid  idea !  I  hope  you'll  let  me  use 
it  in  one  of  my  speeches.  It  will  be  especially 
appreciated  as  one  of  Colonel  Framm's  epi 
grams." 

Framm  grunted  his  consent.     He  wished 


376  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

the  man  would  let  him  alone,  but  he  lingered 
to  help  himself  to  a  second  glass. 

"Ah!  And,  colonel,  I  wish  particularly  to 
congratulate  you  on  your  charming  and — ah — 
brilliant  wife.  A  splendid  speech!  A  telling 
speech!  She  goes  in  for  that  sort  of  thing, 
perhaps  ?" 

"About  once  In  a  lifetime/'  the  colonel  con 
ceded. 

"She  should  cultivate  the  talent — practice 
for  the  rostrum.  Nothing  can  be  gained  with 
out  application.  Public  speaking  is  as  much 
an  art,  I  might  say,  as  acting  or  portrait  paint 
ing/' 

As  he  talked  and  drank  he  swelled  back 
into  his  air  of  sublimity.  Could  it  be  possible 
that  this  ghastly  wreck  thought  of  himself  as 
a  success? 

"I  have  no  doubt/' 

"You  should  groom  that  little  woman  for  a 
career " 

Framm  was  standing  patiently  waiting  for 
the  pest  to  finish  his  glass  and  go  his  way. 

His  head  was  beginning  to  ache  ancj.  he 
hoped  Flossie  wouldn't  dance  all  night. 

"And — ah — colonel.  Before  you  go  would 
you  mind  my  presenting  you  to  Mrs.  Tweed? 


A  PALE  GHOST 279 

Come  here,  my  dear.  Mrs.  Tweed,  Colonel 
Framm.  It  is  seldom  we  have  an  opportunity 
nowadays ' ' 

A  faded  woman  came  forward  out  of  the 
throng.  So  colorless  was  she  that  it  was  a 
full  minute  before  Framm  got  the  true  sig 
nificance  of  the  apparition.  Tall,  thin,  her 
whole  look  somehow  terrible,  the  woman  stood 
before  him  and  calmly  held  out  her  hand. 
Her  hair  was  iron  gray,  her  eyes  deep  sunk, 
and  she  wore  the  same  professional  smirk  as 
did  her  husband.  And  yet  there  was  no 
doubt  about  it  It  was  Carlotta  Beam. 

"How — how  do  you  do,  Mrs.  Tweed  ?"  His 
hand  was  shaking  in  her  cold  and  skinny 
clasp. 

She  made  a  stiff,  peculiar  curtsy.  The 
sight  of  the  dilapidated  evening  gown  over  her 
stringy,  rather  masculine  frame,  the  glimpse 
he  got  of  her  badly  tinted  complexion  made 
him  want  to  laugh  one  of  those  tragic  laughs 
which,  like  a  consumptive  cough,  should  bring 
the  blood.  Should  he  recognize  her?  Should 
he  say  to  her  pompous  failure  of  a  husband 
that  this  was  Carlotta  Beam,  who  had  all  but 
taken  Chester's  life  into  her  strong  hands  to 
mold  into  her  statue  of  true  greatness?  Mrs. 


280  THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 

Tweed  stood  smirking,  a  faded,  naughty,  old- 
maidish  smirk. 

No  sign  of  recognition.  Apparently  the  cue 
was  for  silence. 

"I  was  telling  Colonel  Framm  that  he  ought 
to  be  proud  of  that  little  wife  of  his/'  Tweed 
was  going  glibly  on.  "She  has  the  gift;  per 
haps  not  the  art— but  the  gift." 

"It  was  very  nice/'  was  Carlotta's  cut-and- 
dried  comment.  He  was  shocked  to  hear  her 
voice,  which  had  grown  shrill  and  cracked. 

"Ah.    Just  a  second — only  a  second." 

It  was  not  made  plain  where  Tweed  was 
going,  save  toward  a  quarter  of  the  room 
where  free  drinks  were  easier  to  obtain. 

Only  for  a  secretive  point  of  time  Chester 
Framm  stood  beside  his  early  ideal,  yet  some 
where  in  her  faded  eyes  he  saw  that  vision 
which  had  glowed  so  purely  in  the  days  when 
they  had  sat  under  a  live  oak,  a  book  between 
them. 

"So  you  have  come  to  this/'  she  said  in  a 
tone  which  would  have  seemed  patronizing 
had  it  not  betrayed  a  strain  of  curious  tender 
ness. 

Framm  merely  said  "Yes"  and  smiled. 
Which  was  to  his  credit;  this  was  the  woman 


A  PALE  GHOST  281 

who  in  youth  had  boasted  that  she  could  make 
statesmen  at  will. 

"Well,  Carlotta— this  is  sudden!" 

The  music  had  stopped,  and  Flossie,  detach 
ing  herself  from  old  Hecor's  arm,  came  smil 
ing  toward  her  long-lost  rival. 

"How  do  you  do?"  croaked  Carlotta,  gaunt 
and  forbidding  as  some  old  raven. 

"Of  course  you  know  you're  talking  to  Mrs. 
Tweed?"  Chester  had  put  on  his  most  jovial 
air. 

"Yes,  indeed.  I  saw  you  at  the  table  of 
honor.  It  must  be  great  to  be  in  the  public 
eye  like  that." 

"Thank  you.  We  were  very  much  amused 
by  your — your  pretty  little  speech." 

It  was  like  a  compliment  delivered  from  the 
throne  to  a  deserving  milkmaid. 

"I'm  glad  you  thought  it  pretty.  That's  our 
business,  you  know — making  people  pretty." 

Flossie  never  lost  her  smile,  but  she  said  it 
as  though  she  would  add :  "And  we  could  do 
a  thing  or  two  for  you,  my  dear." 

Mrs.  Tweed  excused  herself  and  walked 
away  toward  the  table  where  the  Prince  of  Bo 
hemia  was  buried  deep  in  someone  else's  cham- 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


pagne.     Floss  had  had  the  last  telling  word. 
Your  best  Prussians,  after  all,  are  women. 

"Candy  kid,"  said  Col.  Chester  Framm  late 
that  night,  addressing  the  silken  bundle  he  was 
holding  in  his  arms  as  their  taxicab  skidded 
homeward,  "I  really  believe  you  requested  that 
Tweed  idiot  to  call  on  me  for  a  speech." 

"I  really  believe  I  did,"  she  recollected, 
speaking  into  his  fur  collar. 

'Why?" 

"Old  Nuisance!  You  had  to*  begin  your 
public  career  somewhere,  now  didn't  you?" 

"Had  to  stop  it  somewhere,  you  mean." 

"You  got  so  tragic  about  your  blighted 
genius.  So  I  thought  I  would  lead  you  to  a 
place  where  you  could  just  uncork  that  old 
speech." 

"I  see.  How  did  you  know  they  made 
speeches  at  the  Bedlam  Restaurant?" 

"Saw  an  ad  in  the  paper.  It  said,  'Bedlam 
Restaurant  —  Night  in  Loveland  —  Anybody 
Allowed  to  Speak  Five  Minutes  —  Feast  of 
Oratory  —  Amateurs  Welcome!'  ' 

Chester  Framm  cringed,  but  she  citing  to 
him  f  urrily,  much  as  a  squirrel  clings  to  a  tree 
in  a  high  wind. 


A  PALE  GHOST  283 

"Are  you  awful  mad,  papa?" 

"No,  angel  cake.  But  tell  me  something 
more — how  did  you  know  Carlotta  Beam  had 
married  that  bad  actor  and  would  be  at  the 
party?" 

"I  just  naturally  find  things  out,  Mister 
Brutal.  That's  my  contribution  to  the  firm." 

And  since  this  is  a  symphony  in  which 
the  movements  run  rapidly  over  a  long  theme, 
let  me  tell  you  what  happened  to  the 
Framms  next  day  just  as  they  were  going  out 
to  lunch  somewhere  along  the  Broadway 
health  resort.  Junius  McKoncle,  president  of 
the  Golden  Poppy  Society,  was  announced, 
and  when  he  came  up  he  explained  that  he 
was  going  to  California  that  very  afternoon 
and  had  come  to  the  Framms  in  haste  and 
secrecy. 

"To  cut  it  short,"  said  he,  "state  and  na 
tional  politics  are  in  a  mess.  Last  week  I  had 
a  conference  with  Senator  Wheeden  and  Gov 
ernor  Wilde,  who  were  passing  on  toward 
Washington.  Some  one  must  be  chosen  wKc> 
will  do  justice  to  the  state  and  yet  be  in  a 
position  where  he  can  say  that  he  has  made 
no  enemies.  We  decided  that  you  would  be 


THE  BLOOMING  ANGEL 


the  man  and  they  asked  me  to  speak  to  you 
and  coax  you  to  consider  the  nomination." 

"For  what?"     Chester's  face  was  grim. 

"Senator  from  California." 

The  silence  emanating  from  the  nominee- 
elect  was  long  and  embarrassing. 

"Goob!"  cried  Floss  in  a  moment  of  rap 
ture,  "don't  you  hear  what  they're  offering 
you?  Don't  mind  him,  Mr.  McKoncle.  He 
accepts.  Go  catch  your  train." 

"I  decline." 

It  came  rumbling  like  a  voice  from  the 
tomb. 

"But  Colonel  Framm!"  McKoncle  was 
quite  shocked,  that  was  sure. 

"I  don't  think  you  realize  the  situation.  If 
you  accept  I  feel  sure  the  state  will  be  with 
you.  A  large  majority  of  the  people 
want  -  " 

"One  thing  I  do  realize,"  grunted  Chester 
A.  Framm,  "and  that  is  what  a  rotten  sena 
tor  I  would  make." 

"Come  here  and  kiss  me,"  commented  Floss, 
which  brought  a  frivolous  note  into  the  con 
vention  and  caused  the  California  delegate  to 
retire  in  disgust. 

And  when  they  were  alone  Chester  said: 


A  PALE  GHOST  285 

^"""^ ~_ ^^m^^^m^i^^amfmm^^mm^mmmm^^f^m^mHmmmmmm^^mm^^ 

"You  have  to  begin  early  with  these  things — 
the  way  you  began  with  your  complexion." 

"What  won-derful  ideas  you  have,  old 
Goob !"  she  confessed  down  his  collar.  "I  be 
gan  with  my  complexion  the  day  I  was  born." 

"What?" 

He  held  her  away  at  arm's  length  and 
studied  the  famous  coloring. 

"How  about  Angel  Bloom  Cream?" 

"Give  it  up,"  she  smiled  as  becomingly  as 
he  could  have  wished.  "I  never  tried  it. 
What's  the  use  of  wasting  it  on  me  when 
there  are  forty  squillion  homely  women  will 
ing  to  pay  a  dollar  and  a  half  a  bottle?" 

Which  was  a  true  word  out  of  the  mouth 
of  the  Framm  Complexion  Girl. 


THE  END 


YB  33058 


